Itfi 



POMIUK 

A WAIF OF LABRADOR 



WILLIAM BYRON FORBUSH 




Class _jF^iX^ 
Book 



Copyright N^ 



T 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 




POMIUK 



POMIUK 



cA Waif of Labrador 



A Brave Boy's Life for Brave Boys 



BY 

WILLIAM BYRON FORBUSH 



BOSTON 

Ube pilgrim press 

NEW YORK CHICAGO 



THE LfOfoXRY OF 

CONGREaS, 

Twu Cof>\xB Receiveb 



DEC -i 1 



• '7 3 (T ? ^ 

'■•"5PY B, 



Copyright, 1903 
William Byron Forbush 



''t ''t"f5! 



Press of J. J. Arakelyan 

295 Congress St 

Boston 








xro doctor XKailfreb erenfell 

A Christian Viking 



PREFACE 



This story of kindness is all true. Some of my readers 
saw the merry face of Pomiuk wTien he was in the United 
States. Many more of them have seen and heard Doctor 
Grenfell, who is quite as much the hero of the story. I 
must acknowledge my deep obligations to the articles and 
the "Pomiuk Scrap-book" of "Mr. Martin of The Congre- 
gationalist," upon which the entire narrative rests, for my 
place is simply that of clerk in the matter. It has been 
a pleasure to be as near to it as that. 

William Byron Forbush. 



CONTENTS 



Pomiuk's Boyhood in the Wild North of Labrador. 13 

PoMiUK AT Chicago 33 

The Quest for Pomiuk 61 

The Rescue 85 

Pomiuk in Kind Hands 99 

Gabriel 123 

PoMiuic's Friends 129 



"A land forsaken and dead. 

Where the ghostly icebergs go 

And come with the ebb and flow 
Of the waters of Bradore ! 
***** 

'O winter land!' he said, 

'Thy right to be I own; 

'God leaves thee not alone. 

And if thy fierce winds blow 

Over drear wastes of rock and snow, 

And at thy iron gates 

The gliostly iceberg waits, 

Thy homes and hearts are dear. 

Thy sorrow o'er thy sacred dust 

Is sanctified by hope and trust; 

God's love and man's are here. 

And love where'er it goes 

Makes its own atmosphere; 

Its flowers of Paradise 

Take root in the eternal ice, 

And bloom through Polar snows !' " 
Whittier: The Rock-Tomb of Bradore. 



Ipomiuk's Bo^boob in the 

Mflb mortb of 

Xabrabor 



I 



POMIUK'S BOYHOOD IN THE WILD 
NORTH OF LABRADOR 

Three or four chattering boys on an icy shore. 

What huge, boat-Hke object are they dragging 
behind them, as they move from the water up 
the bank, while a curly-tailed dog sniffs at their 
burden ? 

It is a seal. 

Look! What are these little men doing out 
in the cold waters in those curious skin boats? 
They are seal hunting. What skill it must take 
to fling their light harpoons as they sit riding 
over the waves! As soon as a seal is struck, 
down it dives, taking the harpoon with it. But 
the harpoon is fastened by twenty fathoms of 
walrus hide to an inflated and air-tight sealskin, 
and the hunter sees it as soon as it comes up. 
A few strokes of the paddle and the boat, kayak 
it is called, is alongside, the seal has been pierced 
with a lance, it is lashed on the back of the 



i6 



Pomiuk 




Pomiuk's Boyhood ly 

little boat and is soon ready for the boys to drag 
to their home. 

Come with me to the homes of the boys and 
you will soon see why Mr. Seal is wanted. Here 
he hangs outside in the cold storage of zero 
weather for food. His skin has been made into 
clothing and into boats. His oil has been used 
for barter or gives a feeble light and warmth 
for the houses. The stretched skin of the bowel 
is used instead of glass in the windows. Dog 
food, dog harness and dog whips are all of seal. 
The seal is the Eskimo's palm tree. 

Pomiuk (Po-me-ook), the largest and merriest 
of these boys, was the child of Kaiouchouak, 
chief of North Labrador, and Anniortama, his 
wife. Would you know where he lived better 
if I tell you it was Tumelosoak, Tessyuyak, 
Nachvak Bay? When I tell you things that he 
and his chums were in the habit of doing, I am 
telling you what all the Eskimo boys do in Lab- 
rador. 

We were visiting his home. It is a wood and 
mud hut, called a "tilt," It has only one room 
and the smoke from the open fire goes out 
through a hole in the roof. The Eskimo used to 
live in skin tents, but now when they wish to 



i8 Pomiuk 

wander they usually build tilts wherever they hap- 
pen to be or, in cold weather, snow huts or igloos 
like their brothers of the Arctic Circle. Some- 
times the poor Eskimo get out of fire and light 
in their three months' winter night. They lie 
dressed in buck-skin and sealskin huddled to- 
gether for months in these huts, which they reach 
through long snow tunnels, crawl out when 
hungry to their supplies hidden beneath the snow, 
eat four pounds of raw meat, and then creep back 
to sleep, almost like black bears, 

Labrador has been said to have "ten months 
winter and two months mighty cold weather." 
Those lines in the book of Job describe its awful 
desolation of night, barrenness and winter better 
than any other : 

"A land of darkness, as darkness itself; 

And of the shadow of death, without any order, 

And where the light is as darkness." 

Yet this is Erik the Norseman's "Vineland." It 
has also been suggested that when God made 
the world he dumped down what he had left as 
Labrador. Yet the folks who live there like it 
and the Eskimo are the most round-faced, smil- 
ing people on earth. 



Pomiuk's Boyhood ip 

Pomiuk really had a happy boyhood. When 
he was a baby he was carried naked in a bag 
on his mother's back, where his black, twinkling 
eyes saw everything that was going on and where 
he was very cozy and warm, unless his mother 
should chance to run or bend over suddenly, when 
he would be flung forward into the snow, a very 
much astonished papoose. 

As soon as he was big enough to chew raw 
walrus, his mother made him a little sealskin 
like her own, for women wear trousers in Es- 
kimo-land. Woolen was unknown and for a piece 
of red calico Queen Anniortama would have bar- 
tered her choicest furs. 

When he was old enough Pomiuk's father be- 
gan his education. Not by taking him to school. 
A school had never been heard of near Nach- 
vak Bay. So instead of using a slate pencil, 
Pomiuk's first tool was a needle for repairing 
nets, then an oar, then a hook and line, and lastly 
the net itself, a boat and possibly a gun. Dur- 
ing this time he was taught to manage dogs, to 
steer komatiks or dog sleds, to set traps and 
snares and to hunt for seals. He must learn, 
said my friend Dr. Grenfell, who told me all 
about him, to turn seal skins for snow rackets 



20 Pomiuk 

and other purposes; to know the country for 
traveling round, the ice and its various phases, 
how to build a tilt for a night on the snow — 
indeed, he must acquire every possible practical 
piece of knowledge he could, for he had to be fish- 
erman, farmer on a small scale, trapper, hunter, 
house-builder, and often enough his own doc- 
tor, and I almost said undertaker. 

Then boys generally have the rabbit snares to 
tend, clever contrivances made with a switch stick 
and twine. A little fence of brush-wood is built 
across a rabbit path on the snow, and a round 
hole left for the rabbit to pass, around which the 
twine is spread. A few tops of young birch are 
strewn around as an additional attraction, for the 
rabbits even on their hind legs cannot reach as 
high as they would like. There is an enormous 
difference in the success of various boys. A cute 
boy will catch a dozen rabbits, while an unobserv- 
ant duffer will be starving his family. In the long 
evenings the boy will first fill needles with twine 
for his father, then learn to net, and soon will 
be a real help in repairing seal or salmon or cod 
nets. 

Before Christmas came the family were in their 
winter house at the bottom of some cozy inlet by 



Pomiuk's Boyhood 21 

the sea, safely frozen in until June. And now 
every morning before daylight Pomiuk went with 
his father to the ice cove where a punt was kept, 
and they rowed off to a headland to lie in wait for 
eider-ducks or long-tailed ducks or auks, which 
fly in great quantities in the fall of the year to 
the coast-line. These he learned to pluck and 
dress and store in snow barrels for use months 
later ; or, perhaps, he went in the dawning to some 
spot where his father had a "gaze" for wild geese 
and took his dog, trained to jump out and run 
back to attract the large companies within shot. 
Meantime he learned to "cronk" as geese do. 
Geese high in air half a mile away will wheel 
into shot when skillfully called or "tolled." Mer- 
gansers, great northern divers, also "toll" well. 
The former will come to a handkerchief waved 
on a stick, the latter to a kind of unearthly laugh. 
Almost all animals can thus be "tolled." Deer 
come to a kind of "snort." Many a seal has been 
lured to its death by a kind of "pough" and the 
legs of the hunter, who is lying on his face, waved 
to and fro. Nothing will "toll" more readily 
than a fox. A sharp lad, seeing a fox before the 
fox sees him, is almost sure of getting him. Not 
only have foxes run up and almost jumped on 



22 Pomiuk 

a hunter hidden behind an ice pinnacle, but one 
on an open marsh "tolled" right up to a kneel- 
ing hunter, who remained motionless. They 
come best to the shriek of a fighting crow or 
raven, because they think they have found food, 
and when near, to the squeak of a mouse. 
Pomiuk soon learned that no animal will toll "up 
wind," that almost all animals trust their noses 
before their eyes. A seal seldom believes his eyes 
at all, and a reindeer will run right over a man 
standing up with his gun to leeward of him. 

Soon he was allowed to accompany his father 
on his fur path. The round of the traps, some- 
times fifty miles in all, lasted a week and involved 
inspecting and "re-tailing" perhaps a hundred 
traps; here, under water, near a hole where 
otters rise, not in too shallow water lest he strike 
it with his breast instead of his paw and so es- 
cape; there, for a fox on a felled tree-stem to 
raise it above snow level, the trap being "tailed" 
with gloved hands and the smell of man removed 
by smoking it in a few burnt feathers. Or he 
learned to build a "lucifer" house, as they call 
the lynx, a neat little house with a bait within 
and a trap biiried inside and outside the door; 
or, perhaps, to make a deadfall for him or for 



Pomiuk's Boyhood 2^ 

a bear. Only last year a boy brought in a fine 
yoiing bear he had caught in his arms after his 
father had shot the old one. One lad who had 
a young pet bear buried it in November in a 
barrel. He dug it up twice in the winter, but 
as it showed no sign of wishing to wake he let 
it sleep until May. Then there were beaver 
houses to find and those clever creatures to out- 
wit ; no small task, I assure you. During a rough 
week there is much to do, even at night. The 
skins must be taken off, boards made and the 
skins stretched and dried. How many American 
boys could make their own "babbage" for snow- 
shoes from a deer they have shot, turn their own 
bows from a birch tree, sew their own boots 
water-tight with sinew from the deer's back? 

Doctor Grenfell told me he was wandering in 
the Spanish Pyrenees three summers ago with 
a half dozen English public school boys and three 
university graduates. . They were anxious to 
spend one night high in the mountains. No one 
had an idea how to build a house to be comfortable 
all night without a shred of bed clothing or one 
single thing besides what he had on. Almost 
any Eskimo could have shown them; and they 
never enjoyed a night better in their lives than 



24 



Pomiuk 



when the Doctor had a bough "lean-to" erected, 
a long cross fire built up, and a good soft bed 




ESKIMO OR WOLF DOGS 



of dried shrubs and spruce tips for them to bur- 
row into. 

The greatest pleasure in winter is dog-driving. 
Every family has from three to a dozen dogs. 



Pomiuk's Boyhood 25 

The best kind of a Labrador dog is like a wolf, 
with pointed nose, grey hair and tail curling over 
his back. Even more than the dogs mentioned 
by Doctor Watts these Eskimo dogs do delight 
to bark and bite. They will at once attack any 
strange animal. They have depopulated Labra- 
dor of pigs and sheep, and even goats are not 
happy near them. Wolves sometimes visit them, 
but there is usually a fight before a visiting wolf 
has tarried long. A good team of dogs will carry 
a load of men and their truck fifty miles a day 
and will travel eight miles an hour. They will 
eat anything — even each other. They will run 
all day and then fight all night. An Eskimo dog 
treats a cat like a pill. Every one in Labrador 
goes visiting in winter, and at whatever house one 
stops he finds shelter. 

When spring began to break up the ice, seal 
hunting commenced, and out on the ice father 
and son went, "chisels and sparbles" in the soles 
of their boots to claw hold with, seal "bat" or 
"gaff" to kill their victims, tow ropes over shoul- 
ders and a bag, perhaps, of walrus meat for food. 
Sharp sheath-knife and steel in their belt and 
gun over their back were all the other baggage 
they needed, and thus they were away from 



26 



Pomiuk 




Pomiuk's Boyhood 2"/ 

daylight to dark, "copying" or jumping from 
floating ice-pan to ice-pan mile after mile, 
or, perhaps, "swatching," that is, hiding behind 
a "gaze" of ice. They would watch some piece 
of open water amidst the ice and shoot any 
old seal that might show his head. Bay seals 
are hunted in kayaks, but "harp" seals are hunted 
by finding a clear piece of water and building a 
shelter of ice near by. They are shot as they 
rise to the surface and are harpooned before they 
can sink. The seal hunters had good chances 
to shoot ducks and other wild birds that always 
fly close over the headlands. They fly so close 
together that, although it may seem incredible, 
thirty have been known to fall at a single 
shot. 

When May comes in, everybody is busy get- 
ting salmon nets ready, and as soon as the ice 
breaks, beds and bedding, stoves and furniture, 
nets and guns, dogs and goats, women and chil- 
dren are carried to the salmon posts on the big 
rivers. Eighty to one hundred salmon, each 
weighing twenty pounds and over, are often 
taken in one night. While the men are watch- 
ing the nets to keep floating ice away, the women 
and boys are sent up the river to net trout. In 



28 Pomiuk 

the winter time the boys catch fish through holes 
in the ice. 

And now tending the nets, spHtting and salt- 
ing salmon would take up all the time of the 
men, for the treacherous ice has to be watched 
night and day lest a "growler" or large ice 
pan should descend on the net and tear it 
to pieces, or tangle it up and carry it away al- 
together. 

As soon as the salmon and trout are disposed 
of and the mosquitoes and black flies arrive, the 
family would move to the "outside" or seacoast 
proper, and now either long lines had to be 
set and tended, one line, perhaps, having one 
thousand hooks, or huge cod traps and cod sieves 
had to be visited in turn, the men and lads often 
going a week without even getting into bed — just 
sleeping in some tent or "tupik" near the fishing- 
ground, or drowsing in the boat itself. 

Boys have their play, too, in Labrador. Mak- 
ing toy bows and arrows, throwing a toy har- 
poon at a mark in the snow and tilting a spear 
through a ring were favorite games of skill. The 
Eskimo's only musical instrument is a rough 
kind of tambourine. The southern Eskimo have 
learned football from the white men, which they 



Pomiuk's Boyhood <?p 

play with a walrus bladder blown full and cov- 
ered with leather, men, women and children 
joining in with fierce delight and constant laugh- 
ter. But Pomiuk was too far away for that. 
His mother taught him how to carve men and 
animals on the smooth white walrus tusks, and 
he may have condescended when he was little to 
play dolls with his sister, for the girls of Labra- 
dor enjoy this motherly game even until they are 
grown up and married. 

The young Eskimo's greatest skill in play is 
shown in handling the dog whip which becomes 
so useful to him later in life. This whip has 
a short, stiff handle and a lash fifty feet long. 
A Yankee fisherman once offered to let an Es- 
kimo give him three strokes about the legs with 
his whip. He covered his stout sea-boots with 
several rolls of thick cloth from an old com- 
forter and then walked forty feet away. At 
the first stroke the Eskimo's whip cut his flesh to 
the bone. He did not tarry for the other two 
strokes. 

Why should a boy in Labrador mourn because 
his toys are few when he does every day the 
things for which men of wealth in America in 
their brief vacations spend large sums of money 



JO Pomiuk 

in the way of sport? To hunt the caribou and 
the great sea birds, to catch a hundred trout in 
an hour or to "toll" a seal from the depths of 
the ocean, to have a swift "randy" of fifty miles 
behind a dog team over the gleaming snow on 
a clear day in March, to go where one wills and 
find in every home a host who will give you wel- 
come and share with you all he has, to hear the 
song of the sea in his old halls, to row past 
cliffs that rise like mountains and glaciers that 
tower like Alps, to approach shores whose Arctic 
lichens and fireweed show the brightest colors 
of a New England forest in autumn, to watch 
the phosphorescence make the sea like silver, to 
see stately icebergs like floating palaces of crys- 
tal move silently southward, to watch cold sun- 
rises of purple splendor by day and auroras of 
a million rainbow tints at night — this is the out- 
door school life of a Labrador boy, this is the 
bright side of boyhood in the Northland. No 
buzzing telephones or rattling telegraphs, no 
crowded daily papers or dull books to read, no 
automobiles to run over you or elevated rail- 
roads to stun your ears or disturb your sleep, but, 
even though the nights be a trifle long, perfect 
stillness and perfect rest, a land without a road, 



Pomiuk's Boyhood ji 

a jail, a policeman or a licensed saloon. Such 
was the busy, happy boyhood of Pomiuk. He 
had never heard of the United States and he had 
never seen a white boy in his life. 



pomiuh at Chicago 



II . 

POMIUK AT CHICAGO 

Once: upon a time a Massachusetts boy, for the 
benefit of his health, broken in school, took a 
summer trip to Labrador on a Newburyport fish- 
ing schooner, accompanied by three or four other 
New England students. They remained on their 
vessel in the landlocked harbor of Salmon Bay 
in the Straits of Belle Isle, enjoyed the novel 
experiences of ocean travel and a sojourn on that 
wild coast, and returned in the fall to their 
homes. The connection of this excursion with 
the present story will soon appear. 

This was almost fifty years ago, but it is still 
true that a few schooners from Massachusetts, 
and many more from Canada and Newfoundland, 
sail to Labrador every year, carrying the fisher- 
men, 20,000 of them, to catch "the coin of the 
realm," the codfish. Just as soon as the ice is 
blown off the coast by westerly winds, these 
"greenfish catchers" arrive. 



jd Pomiuk 

"In spring, nets only are used, for the fish are 
in shoals, feeding on the myriads of caplin, a 
fish the size of a sardine, which are in shore then 
to spawn. The most successful net is the cod- 
trap. Practically it is a submerged parlor of 
net without a roof, but with la large door, into 
which the cod are invited to walk by a long 
net leading to the nearest headland of rock, and 
ending at the center of the door. It is all kept 
in position by heavy anchors. The distance from 
the rock is from a hundred to a hundred and 
fifty yards. Cod are gregarious fish, and, like 
sheep, follow a leader. When, therefore, one 
comes up against the net as he swims near the 
rocks, he turns out into deeper water to circum- 
vent it, and so leads his confiding following 
directly into the net. Here, being a platonic fish, 
he remains, indolently browsing on the infusoria 
and ocean slime which collect about the twiny 
walls of his prison. Suddenly a boat appears 
overhead, and a long telescope, with a plain glass 
bottom — the fish glass — is pushed down into the 
room, through which the trap-master is peering 
to see how many finny prisoners there are. Now 
the door is pulled up, and now the door is ris- 
ing — rising — rising, being passed right over the 



Pomiuk at Chicago 27 

boat, until all the frightened captives are huddled 
together in one seething mass near the surface. 
Now a dipper is put in, and the jumping, strug- 
gling fish are heaved into the boat. Soon the 
boat is full to the gunwale, and still there are 
more prisoners. Large bags of net are pro- 
duced and filled with the rest of the fish. These, 
after being buoyed, are thrown overboard to 
wait till they are 'wanted.' " 

It is a hard life these fishermen live; during 
the season constant excitement and overwork, a 
few hours sleep in a damp mud hut, and then 
at it again; wild dashes along an uncharted 
coast lined with crags and reefs, the treacher- 
ous fogs and icebergs, the sudden, cruel storms, 
and then after all a small profit, eaten up at 
once by the wretched system of barter by which 
the shore merchants keep most of the fishermen 
constantly in debt. Oftentimes thus our common 
breakfast fare is paid for by men's lives. Yet 
men go there year after year, and even women 
and girls go with them, to work at cleaning fish. 

The white people Avho stay all the year long 
are called livieres or planters. They pass a mis- 
erable winter in their poorly built huts, most of 
them having no clothing but what they wear 



Pomiuk at Chicago jp 

on their backs. They are often isolated from 
the outer world for eight months. The Mora- 
vian missionaries do not believe in prayers for 
the dead, but they were praying for Queen Vic- 
toria for half a year before they knew of her 
death. They do not know the taste of beef or 
fresh milk. There is but one cow in Labrador. 
Molasses is used instead of sugar. Salt pork, 
dried peas, rice and oatmeal and powder and 
shot enough to get fresh meat with make a man 
rich. People who tried to grow potatoes had 
to put nightclothes over them when they got 
under their own. Turnip tops and wild berries 
alone keep off the dread scurvy. Most of the 
people reach spring half or almost starved. 
Many of them have not clothes enough to tempt 
them to get out of bed in winter. 

This has been given to me as the menu of a 
fisherman's dinner, of course as a burlesque: 

HAGDOWN SOUP 

("Hagdown," a very oily, fishy bird.) 

HAGDOWN STEW 

(Made of what would n't make soup.) 
"mug-up" 
(Some "fearsome" tea.) 

FLOUR BREAD 

(second quality.) 



40 Pomiuk 

OLEOMARGARINE 

(very suspicious.) 
'''pipsey" 
(Dry cod, rubbed with seal oil, and dressed with cran- 
berries, if there are any.) 

Yet some of the settlers prosper in a rough 
way and become attached to this their adopted 
land. I have read of an old Englishman who 
went to this country followed by his sons. Not 
less than seventy-six grandchildren now live 
around him. A barrel of flour a week is used 
up in his house. In the evening the young fel- 
lows sit around a blazing log fire on strong home- 
made settles, the snow outside six to ten feet 
deep — with always some new yarn to tell, some 
new puzzle to solve, some piece of work to 
be done. There are always fish for the table 
in summer, trout and sea birds in spring and 
venison in winter. 

In Northern Labrador crowds of quaint little 
people visit any vessels which anchor in their 
harbor. They look like elves. They wear skins 
and have snow-white jumpers topped by long 
pointed cowls that stand high up over their heads. 
They skip noiselessly about in sealskin boots. The 
men look just like the women, except that they 



Pomiuk at Chicago 



41 




42 Pomiuk 

liave very scanty beards. They have long, 
straight black hair, cut fringelike, level with the 
eyebrows. These are Innuits, "the people," as 
they call themselves. "Huskies" the fishermen 
call them. We say Eskimo. A childlike people, 
short-sighted and fickle, with round, fat faces 
almost always laughing, with teeth that show 
the effects of long chewing of half-cooked meat 
(covered with ashes and oil) and skins that bear 
the layers of many seasons of dirt (for Labrador's 
only bathtub is the icy Atlantic), they are never- 
theless a lovable folk. They are not very tender, 
though they are careful in a rough way of their 
childreit, and they have no such word in their 
language as kindness, but they are generous and 
brave, and when they learn the Christian way 
they follow it like little children. S 

It was one of the experiences of our Massachu- 
setts student of the fifties that he saw the dark 
side of life in Labrador. There was no church 
among all these settlements. And yet it was men 
like these fishermen who were the first to follow 
Jesus of Nazareth, who told his life and who 
built on the rock foundation of their faith the 
Christian Church. Jesus loved such men and 
loves them now. The brave Moravians had had 



Pomiuk at Chicago 43 

missions on a distant part of the same coast for 
many years. A noble, self-sacrificing band, 
generation after generation of them had served 
God on this iron coast. Their wives come to 
them by lot from beyond the sea, and at seven 
years their children go away from them back 
across that sea, never to see their parents again. 
But these Moravians could not begin to visit 
all the little hamlets and their nearest mission 
was more than 400 miles away from the Straits 
of Belle Isle. There were no schools. There were 
no books. The children were growing up in 
ignorance. And behind all these people, immi- 
grants or descendants of immigrants from Great 
Britain and the British colonies, there was, far 
to "the nor'ard," the dark fringe of the Eskimo, 
worshiping spirits, cheated by their ignorant 
medicine men, and living in vileness of body and 
soul. 

The Massachusetts boy returned home to re- 
sume his studies and afterward to go into busi- 
ness. But he could not forget these needy people 
of the North. Several times he asked officers of 
missionary societies why they did nothing for the 
Labrador people. Finally one of them told him 
of a new society in Montreal that might be in- 



^^ Pomiuk 

terested in Labrador. He wrote and received 
an answer stating that their projected society 
was just about to be disbanded, for lack of a 
special field or a missionary to go to it. Per- 
haps, they said, Labrador was his field, and 
this young man their missionary. He indeed 
had scarcely thought of such a thing, but he soon 
decided that he could not refuse so direct a sum- 
mons. 

So our chance excursionist of a few years 
before, now twenty-one years old, went again to 
Newburyport and sailed away on a fishing 
schooner, with a box of Bibles and another of 
reading-books, to the Labrador coast. The fam- 
ilies whom he had known at the time of his 
previous visit received him kindly, and urged 
him to teach their children. This he began to do, 
but also took a long trip on foot along the road- 
less coast to select the best place for a station, 
returning then to "America" with his report. 
The next year he sent a cargo of lumber down 
from Montreal, and with such help as he could 
get erected a commodious mission-house on 
Caribou Island, Salmon Bay (the very harbor 
where he had once anchored), that being a cen- 
tral point for the scattered "livieres" and the 



Pomiuk at Chicago 45 

harbors of the American and Nova Scotia fishing 
fleets. Before it was completed a fearful Octo- 
ber gale carried away the roof and made neces- 
sary another home trip to get more funds and 
more lumber. The latter he took down the 
St. Lawrence on a chartered Quebec schooner, 
together with a noble-hearted Scotch woman as 
teacher, and, as a temporary helper for the sum- 
mer, a young New England student who af- 
terward fell as "The Color Bearer" at Port 
Hudson. 

For seven years in all, our friend of the health 
excursion, reinforced in due time by a Massa- 
chusetts wife, labored on the coast, as missionary 
of the Montreal Society and chaplain of the 
American Seamen's Friend Society, visiting the 
seamen on their vessels, and the shoremen in their 
homes, holding Sabbath services in the island 
chapel, and in the winter removing home and 
church and school to the winter settlement on 
Eskimo River. His health failed after enduring 
the hardships and rigorous climate of such a 
coast, and he came back to America in time to 
minister to the sick and dying soldiers in the 
last winter of our Civil War, and to walk into 
the city of Petersburg on the memorable morning 



46 Pomiuk 

of its surrender, in company with Charles Carle- 
ton Coffin. 

An incident which connects one of those 
Labrador homes with the books of our own Ed- 
ward Everett Hale, is also associated with so 
many romantic traditions, as well as with the 
poem from which I have quoted on one of the 
opening pages of the book that I must reproduce 
it from the letter written by this missionary many 
years afterward to Dr. Hale, and published in his 
"Lend a Hand Record." 

"How long the winter seemed to the young mis- 
sionaries from New England in war-time ! The last 
news, as the curtain fell one autumn, was of the 
enemy near Washington, and the "no'the'ners" re- 
treating. It was June before the suspense ceased, 
as looking from our flagstaff with a glass, we saw 
the topmast of am American schooner through a 
notch in the hills, and on it the dear old stars and 
stripes — ^then we knew we had a country ! 

"Not far from the narrowest point in the Straits 
of Belle Isle was the most historic and most ro- 
mantic place of all, the great bay of Bradore (Bras 
d'Or), settled by the French and frequented by the 
Basque whalers long before our Pilgrim Fathers 
landed on Pymouth Rock. It was then Brest, 'the 
chief town of New France,' a populous, prosperous 
settlement, and part of a famous French seigniory. 
After the conquest of Quebec the region was 
slowly and very sparsely settled by the English, in 
place of the French. One bit of local history is 



Pomiuk at Chicago 47 

romance itself. About 1790, an English ship 
bound up the St, Lawrence was wrecked, as so 
many others have been, in the treacherous straits 
not far from Bradore. The only female passenger 
was a lady of noble birth ; by tradition she, or per- 
haps her mother, was the natural daughter of an 
earl, I think, of Courtenay. She bore the name of 
Mary Ann Vane. Who knows but she was akin 
to Sir Harry, the Puritan governor at Boston? 
She was on her way to Quebec to marry a young 
English officer stationed there. A young EngHsh- 
man from the opposite shore of Newfoundland Avas 
moved to arrange for her maintenance for the win- 
ter, planning to return, when the Straits were open 
in the spring, and win her as his bride. But mean- 
time the seignior of St. Paul's river, one Louis 
Chevalier, came on a winter's cruise with his dogs 
down the coast. He came, saw and conquered — 
persuaded her that her afifianced soldier was doubt- 
less killed, or, in any case, would surely think 
her lost at sea, and find another love. So it came 
about that the high born English lady married the 
French salmon-catcher, and lived ever after the life 
of a stately recluse on the banks of Eskimo River. 
"One of her children became the wife of the 
English proprietor of Bradore, and so showed her 
noble blood that the plainer settlers called her the 
'Queen of Bradore.' When I lived on the coast, I 
heard this curious story of her. Many years be- 
fore, Audubon saihng along the shore in his or- 
nithological researches, visited Bradore. He was 
most courteously entertained by Madame Jones, 
who greatly regretted that a very remarkable mu- 
sical instrument which she had imported, had been 
sent to Quebec for repairs. Being asked by the 
great naturalist what it was, she owned that she had 



48 Pomiuk ' 

forgotten the name, but described it as standing 
on four legs like a table, and having at one end a 
crooked handle, the turning of which — even by her 
children or servants — brought out the most ele- 
gant music! Audubon checked the rising smile of 
his young companion, and told her the name of her 
wonderful instrument. 

"Opening out of this same Bradore Bay — after 
passing dreaded ledges, on which I well remember 
lying in our Quebec schooner, loaded with lumber 
for a mission house, for a day and a night in 
i860 — is a small, circuitous inlet, ending in a land- 
locked harbor; that is Belle's Amours, What 
lost romance of love gave it its name I never 
knew; but there was a strange charm about that 
quaint, quiet home on the shore of the bay, with 
its one house and the usual fishing-stage and store- 
cabin. The master was son of an English immi- 
grant, intelHgent, honest, large-hearted. The mis- 
tress was like unto him, full of good works and 
almsdeeds which she did to all in trouble or need. 
The 'Belle's Amours House/ was on the kom-a- 
tik route from bay to bay, and entertained all the 
shore-folk as they traveled for business or pleasure 
— a hospitahty I often tested. Oh, the pork cake, 
the murr's eggs pancakes, the delicious *bake- 
apple' (rubus chamaemorus) dishes ! 

"The mother and daughters were devout Catho- 
lics. The eldest was remarkable in her thirst for 
knowledge and her sincere devotion to her re- 
ligion. With conscientious regularity she bowed 
before the crucifix and the picture of the blessed 
Virgin whose name she bore. She borrowed all 
the books she could from priest or minister, read 
them and taught the younger ones to read. 
Storm-bound at one time in this home, I looked 



Pomiuk at Chicago 4P 

around for something to read, and was surprised 
to find your books in the possession of this girl, 
who had received them, I suppose, from some 
traveler. They had been thoroughly read, and 
were read once more that day with delight ! In- 
spired by such influences, though narrowed by her 
surroundings and perhaps by the limitations of her 
church, she was a true-hearted woman, living 'In 
His Name' to be good and to do good to others. 
"You ask, 'What has become of that girl?' Let 
me first tell you of a strange little graveyard on a 
sand-hill, not far from the house. The path over 
the moss from the next bay led past it, and I often 
stopped to read the inscriptions carved or painted 
on the humble stones or boards which marked the 
graves. One which I carefully copied was: — 

" 'Sacred to the memory of Jane, the beloved 
daughter of James Chambers, of Deadman's Cove, 
Newfoundland, and the niece of John and Fanny 
Buckle of Belle's Amours, Labrador. She was 
born the i8th June, 1830, and died with Christian 
fortitude on the 19th August, 1852.' 

"We loved her: yes, no tongue can tell 

How much we loved her, and how well. 

God loved her too, and He thought best 

To take her home to be at rest." 

"Readers of Whittier will at once recall his 
beautiful poem, 'The Rock-tomb of Bradore.* De- 
spite the poetical license — for the grave is not 
strictly in Bradore, nor was it a rock-tomb or a 
cave, and it was not true that her 

"... blood had equal share 

Of the lands of vine and snow, 

Haff French, half Eskimo" — 

the poetry of the place and the epitaph is properly 



50 Pomiuk 

transferred to the exquisite verses of our Quaker 
poet. . . . 

"Brave old John Buckle succumbed to disease, 
and was laid in the little enclosure. The mother, 
visiting children in the United States, sickened and 
died there, and was buried in an ancient Catholic 
cemetery in South Boston, Misfortune and 
poverty came to the once prosperous home at 
Belle's Amours. Mary was besought to go to the 
States, too, but she steadfastly refused. She would 
stay and care for her brother's children, she would 
live and die in the home of her birth. At last she, 
too, sickened and faded away under slow and pain- 
ful disease. One morning, when all were away at 
their work in the fishing stage, she grew worse ; 
when they returned, she had fallen asleep. And 
now she lies in that dreary God's acre beside the 
'rock-tomb of Bradore,' whose epitaph she had so 
often read 

"Years after my first sojourn in Labrador, I 
visited the coast again and went to Belle's Amours. 
The mother and daughter showed me a pot of 
New England flowers in the sunny window, and 
said, 'They are from the seed you brought us from 
your country so many years ago.' You may feel 
sure that the good seed of your books, so long ago 
sown beside those waters, has brought forth fruit 
after its kind through all these years — perchance 
is yielding its fruit still!" 

But what has all this to do with "Pomiuk at 
Chicago" ? I will tell you. In the spring of 
1892 this former missionary received a letter one 
day from one of his chums who had gone with 
him on that first summer excursion to the North, 



Pomiuk at Chicago 57 

and who had now become a successful business 
man on the Pacific Coast. This man wrote that 
a company had been organized to exhibit at the 
World's Fair (which was to be given the next 
year at Chicago) an Eskimo village and Labra- 
dor trading post. He asked our friend to give 
him .all the information he could as to the best 
way to go and secure a company of Eskimo 
people to come over with their dogs and sledges 
and furs to the great Exposition. Of course he 
was glad to accommodate his old comrade and so 
he took considerable trouble to forward charts 
and books about the Labrador coast to the com- 
pany on the Pacific and arranged for the charter- 
ing of a Halifax schooner to take the expedition 
to the far North as soon as the ice should break 
up. 

A few months later, in the month of October, 
fifty-seven men and women, of stunted stature, 
with swarthy skin, flat noses, straight black hair 
and rounded cheeks, suggestive of blubber, could 
be seen lolling on the decks of the steamer 
schooner Everlina, in Boston harbor. These were 
the Labrador people who were going to inhabit 
the Eskimo village at the World's Fair. Their 
trip to Boston had been uneventful, except for 



52 Pomiuk 

the difficulty of providing satisfactory food for 
the Eskimo. They would not eat cooked articles 
of any sort, and soon became tired of the sun- 
dried seal meat, venison and fish with which the 
ship's larder had been plentifully supplied. In 
this emergency one of .the English speaking 
Eskimo suggested trailing lines for fish, and soon 
the whole company made a good catch, which 
they ate raw. At Port Hawkesbury they had 
put in for provisions; a barrel of cabbages had 
been bought and opened on the deck; within fif- 
teen minutes every bit of the contents of that 
barrel had disappeared, the Arctic passengers 
having eaten all parts of the vegetable. Some 
apples were offered them, but they did not like 
them. Raw potatoes and raw turnips were eaten 
with a relish. 

This party consisted of twelve families, among 
whom were twenty-nine women and nineteen 
children. As the Exposition was not formally 
opened until the next spring, the Eskimo were 
exhibited in Chicago during the winter. Dur- 
ing that time a little girl was born in the village, 
who was named Everlina, in honor of the Hali- 
fax schooner on which they came from Labra- 
dor, and a little boy, whom they named Chris- 



Pomiuk at Chicago 33 

topher Columbus, in honor of the Exposi- 
tion. 

The next autumn our friend, whom many chil- 
dren know as "Mr. Martin," went to the World's 
Fair, and of course one of the first places that he 
visited was the Eskimo village. Here he took 
a ride on a komatik, pulled by Labrador dogs. 
As there was no snow in Chicago, it was drawn 
on a narrow-gauge railroad. He also rode in 
a kayak on the lagoon. He was specially in- 
terested in a little boy found in one of the cabins, 
confined to his bunk from hip disease, whose 
name was Pomiuk, but who — for advertising pur- 
poses — was called "Prince" Pomiuk by the man- 
agers of the village, because his father was a chief 
in Northern Labrador. He had learned a little 
English and Mr. Martin got him to laughing by 
imitating dog driving and telling him of one of 
his experiences with children in an Indian mitch- 
waup (wigwam), when he was in Labrador. 
He also promised to send him a souvenir postal, 
which he mailed that very afternoon from the 
Postal Station in the Exposition grounds. The 
next time he went to see Pomiuk he found he 
was very much pleased with the card and was 
eager to know if the boat, the United States ship 



54 Pomiuk 

"Illinois," pictured on the card, belonged to Mr. 
Martin! When Mr. Martin went away he said 
to him, "aukshenai," which is the Eskimo word 
for good-bye, as well as the word of greeting. 

Now we left Pomiuk hunting and fishing gaily 
on his native heath. What had brought him to 
this country and how had the lively young sports- 
man become an invalid? 

Well, Chief Kaiouchouak, Pomiuk's father, 
was a mighty hunter and a stern ruler, but he 
was a good man. He was about the only Eski- 
mo who was honest and who never let himself 
get into debt. Most Eskimo think thieving is 
just one sort of a practical joke. Naturally he 
prospered. So some of his neighbors got jealous 
of him. One day he was being entertained by 
a man named Kolleligak at the foot of the big 
mountains called the Kaumejek. The tilt was 
crowded and so, as is the custom in such cases, 
he was building him a snow hut for the night. 
You know what they are like. They look like big 
white mole-hills. It takes only half an hour to 
build one. The snow is cut in blocks from the 
inside of the circle chosen for the house. So 
the hut goes up and down at the same time. A 
hole is left at the top for air and a block is cut 



Pomiuk at Chicago 55 

to fit in the door from the outside when the 
owner is inside. Kaiouchouak was stooping 
down to form a large piece of snow into a block. 
Kolleligak who had secretly been jealous of him 
for a long time crept up from behind and 
shot him in the back. He fell down on 
the snow and rolled over and said : "Who did 
that?" 

"I did, because we were afraid of you," said 
Kolleligak, and then as he lay wounded on the 
snow he shot him again, and there he left his 
body. Then he went in search of Kaiouchouak's 
two brothers and when he found them he pointed 
his loaded gun at them and made them swear 
never to molest him. So all they could do was 
to go to the mountain and cover up their broth- 
er's body with big stones, that the wolves should 
not eat it. Here on a barren hillock, with his 
weapons in his hand, they laid him, where he 
could overlook the scenes of his exploits, and 
whence his spirit, as they believed, could hunt for- 
ever, as in life, the spirits of the walrus and the 
caribou. 

The mother married again at once, as is the 
Eskimo custom, and gave her children away. 
Pomiuk and his sister Skeepah were taken by 



5d Pomiuk 

Semigak, the medicine man, who possessed three 
wives. Their little brother Kippinguk was taken 
by an old Eskimo sorceror called Tuglavina, who 
took him away to live among the big dark moun- 
tains at Nachvak. When Pomiuk came to the 
World's Fair he was in charge of an Eskimo 
called Kupah. All these people were heathen, 
because they came from a part of Labrador which 
was farther north than any to which mission- 
aries had ever gone. 

When Mr. Martin said "aukshenai" to Pomiuk, 
he promised to send him his photograph. During 
the autumn he heard from the little boy once or 
twice, and learned that he was getting better 
and that he had started safely for his Labrador 
home. The Exposition people had arranged 
that the Eskimo should be conducted safely back 
to Labrador, and as the previous season had been 
a poor one for fishing, it is probable that most of 
them had found their novel experience in Amer- 
ica profitable as well as interesting. There is 
something sad, however, about the exhibiting 
of human beings as objects of curiosity and 
it was especially pathetic to think that had not 
Pomiuk come to America he would perhaps 
never have been injured, for it is probable that 



Pomiuk at Chicago 57 

it was the roughness of Kupah which had broken 
the little boy's hip. A great many American 
children saw Pomiuk and were attracted to him 
because he was the liveliest and merriest of all 
the Eskimo children. Before his injury Pomiuk 
had distinguished himself above all the other 
children by his skill with the dog whip. The 
white visitors would place a small coin on the 
ground as a target and the first Eskimo who 
could hit it at thirty feet with the whiplash won 
it. Pomiuk always hit it first. Mr. Martin has 
been for a number of years the editor of a chil- 
dren's page (called the "Corner") in one of our 
American religious weeklies. Of course he re- 
ported the Eskimo village and Pomiuk to his 
readers, some of whom in a later visit to the Fair 
mentioned Mr. Martin's name to Pomiuk and 
were much pleased to see his smile of recognition. 
"You come Boston?" "Yes." ''You knozv Mar- 
tinr "Yes." "Hi:i.i.o!" 

The Eskimo family ("Mr." Kupah and his 
wife Kootookatook Kupah) that had charge of 
Pomiuk landed at Bonne Bay, on the west shore 
of Newfoundland, where they spent the winter 
quite comfortably in a house which had been 
kindly loaned to them by the postmaster. Here 



58 Pomiuk 

they were waiting until the ice should melt, hop- 
ing then to reach a harbor in northern New- 
foundland, whence they could get a passage on 
some fisherman's schooner to their still distant 
home. Mr. Martin had not forgotten his promise 
and after a long correspondence learned where 
Pomiuk was spending the winter, and through 
the postmaster and a Christian magistrate suc- 
ceeded in getting his photograph to Pomiuk. 
Pomiuk received it, and both the postmaster and 
the magistrate answered for him, saying that 
he was using crutches, and "Everlina" was well. 

The Eskimo moved slowly north and part of 
the next winter Pomiuk stayed at Ramah, a 
Moravian settlement, where the kind care of the 
missionaries probably saved his life. 

Somehow Mr. Martin could not forget the little 
boy and so a year later — in the spring of 1895 — 
he sent him a letter. Of course he did not know 
where on that desolate coast the boy, even if alive, 
would be. There were no dog sledge mails nor 
even fishing schooners or trading vessels that 
went so far north. So he sent his letter at a 
venture in charge of the Pludson Bay Company, 
to Montreal, addressing it in care of their post 
at Nachvak, the former home of the boy. The 



Pomiuk at Chicago 59 

boy's guardian might be hunting walrus a hun- 
dred miles away and might never receive it. 
They forwarded it by a schooner leaving Quebec 
with supplies for the Labrador posts two months 
later. This letter continued in its long journey 
until many months after. It was at last left at 
the Hudson Bay station at the end of a long, deep 
fiord among the high mountains of northern 
Labrador. There had lived for twenty years 
Mr. Ford, the fur trader, the northernmost white 
man, with his wife, two boys and a girl, far from 
any other house or home. He took care of the 
letter, although he thought it of little importance. 
Not long after Kupah went by in his skin boat, 
with his wife and children, to trade seal skins 
and to go up the river to catch trout. He had 
Pomiuk with him. They camped on a bleak 
shore called Tessyuyak, at the foot of the black 
crags called the Tongaks or Devil Mountains. 
Mr. Ford probably did not know that Pomiuk 
was now so neglected that he did not even have 
clothing. The Eskimo have little sympathy for 
pain and suffering. His hip trouble was so se- 
rious, too, that he would not have dared to treat 
him. He believed his death was near. The letter 
which brought kind wishes had not been opened 



do Pomiuk 

or read. Pomiuk, fatherless, motherless, friend- 
less, seemed left to die. 

But all this time a friend unknown to him, 
guided by God, was seeking him. 



^be (Sluest for pomiuk 



Ill 

THE QUEST FOR POMIUK 

Think of a country without a doctor! and 
that a fearfully cold country like Labrador, 
specially exposed to pneumonia and scurvy, and 
to every contagious disease! To illustrate, using 
a minor ailment, how would you like to have 
the toothache all winter for lack of three minutes' 
skilled surgery? There were a few silly old 
Angekoks or witchmen, who robbed the poor 
people without making them any better. There 
was a woman, too, whose only remedy was a 
bread poultice, which she applied on all occasions. 
The worse the disease, the bigger the poultice. 
Then there was a consulting woman healer, 
whose remedies were cod oil and molasses. 

There is in this bay also a sorcerer. If no seals 
come into the bay, he must make them come. 
To do this he is tied legs and arms in his hut 
alone. He gets out of the hut, possibly through 
the skin window, as the door is barred, and lies 



64 Pomiuk 

on the top. His soul then goes to the moon, 
where dwells Supperguksoak, the woman who 
is mother of all seals. She will then drop 
a seal into the water, though she will not tell 
him where, and, presumably, this prodigy will 
lead its confiding kith and kin into Nachvak 
Bay, ready for the harpoons of the human little 
Eskimos. When a seal is killed they must al- 
ways give the body a drink of fresh water before 
they cut it, and then split its eyes. Thus they 
will bring another seal for the water, and blind 
it, so that it will not see them. They have a 
similar custom with white bears or ice-bears. 
When they go to cut it up, they first cut off 
right around the lip, in order to prevent the next 
bear biting them. Here, also, if they have been 
sick and go bear-hunting, they must wear a piece 
of the skin on the arm of their kossak, to show 
the bear that they are strong and well again, 
and are to be feared. So, if twice sick, two pieces 
and so on. 

Wounds, no matter how frightful, were usually 
treated by squirting tobacco juice into them and 
binding them tightly with an old rag. And some 
settlements were too poor to have either rags or 
tobacco. Frozen feet and fingers were amputated 
with a dull case-knife. 



The Quest for Pomiuk 6^ 

Doctor Wilfred Grenfell was born on the banks 
of the Dee, where it empties into the Irish Sea, on 
the west coast of England, his family coming 
from Devonshire, where for generations back 
they had been a line of those old sea-dogs who 
fought with Spain upon the sea. When he was 
a boy, his kinsman, Charles Kingsley, the boy's 
hero, who wrote Hypatia and Westward Ho! 
took him on his knee and called him a "real 
Saxon." He is related by marriage to Max Mul- 
ler and James A. Froude. He lived so near the 
ocean when he was a boy that in heavy storms 
the waves would dash up over the sea wall 
against his house. He was fond of the water 
from his earliest childhood. When he was quite 
young his brother and he built a boat in the nur- 
sery — a long, curious-looking craft, painted red, 
which they called "Reptile" — in which they spent 
many happy hours and sometimes nights on the 
neighboring sea. At Oxford he was a crack 
athlete. He had a life of worldly success and 
social prominence before him. He had been con- 
firmed in the English Church, but the event had 
not meant a great deal to him. One evening 
when he was a medical student he dropped into 
the Tabernacle in East London, where Mr. Moody 



66 Pomiuk 

was speaking. That great, generous personality 
impressed him. "I hadn't anything hke that!" 
he has stated as his confession after hearing 
this address. 

As he left with the crowd, he came to the con- 
clusion that his religious life was a humbug. He 
vowed in future that he would either give it up or 
make it real. It was obviously not a thing to be 
played with. 

"I was then playing," he says, "on several athletic 
teams, and confess that the idea of a sneer and a 
cold shoulder had no attractions for me, and it had 
never occurred to me that popularity might be too 
dearly paid for at the price of my own inde- 
pendence. 

"Some time later I heard that one of England's 
famous cricketers, whose athletic distinctions I 
greatly admired, Mr. J. E. K. Studd, was going to 
speak in the neighborhood, and I went to hear 
him. Seated all in front of me there were two or 
three rows of boys from a training-ship, all dressed 
in the same uniform. At the end of his speech Mr. 
Studd invited any one who was not ashamed to 
confess that Christ was his Master for this life, 
rather than a kind of insurance ticket for the next 
world, to stand up. I was both ashamed and sur- 
prised to find that I was afraid to stand) up. I did 
not know I was afraid of anything. One boy out 
of all this large number rose to his feet. I knew 
pretty well what that meant for him, so I decided 
to back him up and do the same. 

"With this theological outfit, I started on my 
missionary career. What to do was the next ques- 
tion. I went to the parson of a church where I 



The Quest for Pomiuk 6^ 

occasionally attended, and offered myself for a class 
of boys in his Sunday-school. They were down- 
right East Londoners, and their spiritual education 
needed other capacities than those I had, in my 
mind, till then endowed the Sunday-school teacher 
with. I remember being- surprised that one boy, 
whom I carried to the door by the seat of his 
trousers and heaved into the street, objected by 
endeavoring to kick, while his 'pals' in the school 
were for joining him in open mutiny. He got the 
last word, however, by climbing up outside the 
window and waving a hymn-book which he had 
stolen. 

"The next time I arrived the boys had got in 
before me (and out also), and the pictures and 
furniture were not as I had left them. I started 
to reform them in the ways that appealed most to 
myself, and, having a house of our own, with four 
other medical students, we used to clear our dining- 
room furniture through the window, and replace it 
wnth a horizontal bar and a couple of pairs of box- 
ing-gloves. We were able to lead in these things 
our noisiest boys, and they learned to control their 
own tempers and respect our capacities more. 

"We amalgamated with the boys also for the 
purpose of escaping together from the slums when 
the summer hoHday came on. After my first ex- 
perience of some of my poor lads' masters, we felt 
like starting a physical missionary enterprise of a 
different kind for their behoof. 

"We hired a car and went to North Wales, tak- 
ing with us tents, etc. The simplest possible outfit 
of food and clothing was provided. The boys de- 
veloped in every way — one, indeed, bloomed into 
the strong man in a traveling circus. 

"My medical course being finished, I began to 



68 Pomiuk 

cast about for some way in which I could satisfy 
the aspirations of a young medical man and com- 
bine it with a desire for adventure and definite 
Christian work. Sir Frederick Treves., the famous 
surgeon, also a daring sailor and master mariner, 
who had twice helped us at our camps, and for 
whom I had been doing the work of an 'interne' at 
the London Hospital, suggested my seeing if a 
doctor could live at sea among the deep-sea fisher- 
men on one of the vessels of the Society of which 
he was a member of the council. 

His family was of a race of fighters and sailors, 
— a near kinsman is a general of British forces to- 
day, — and so it was natural that he should be a 
sailor and a fighter for Christ. He was also study- 
ing medicine under Sir Andrew Clarke, that 
great-hearted surgeon, of whom you have read in 
Ian Maclaren's story, Vx^ho took Lily Grant to his 
home when she was dying. These two brave 
Christian physicians determined his life's work. 
The Royal National Mission to Deep Sea Fish- 
ermen (whose patron was good Queen Victoria 
and whose patron now is her gracious Alajesty, 
Alexandra) was about to add to its work of 
mercy in the North Seas a mission to Labrador. 
The little steamer Alert was fitted out and 
Doctor Grenfell, whose membership in the Lon- 
don Cruising Club had made him a "certificated 
master mariner," was put in command. This 



The Quest for Pomiuk 6p 

was in 1892. Two years he sailed the Alert, but 
in 1894 he was given a staunch little steamer, 
named the Sir Donald Smith, for the great 
Canadian philanthropist, who had been in his 
youth an agent for thirteen years of the Hudson 
Bay Company on the Labrador coast and so knew 
all the trials and hardships of the people. 

Here is a description of one season of Dr. Gren- 
fell's work in northern Newfoundland: 

"Drove 1,500 miles among very poor fisher-folk, 
preaching and doctoring. Started and ran the jail- 
house as a social club and center for lending litera- 
ture, only one on coast. Ditto foot-ball club. Dit- 
to Scripture Union Society. Ambulance lectures 
regularly; shall leave some one competent to aid 
people where there are no doctors. Lectured on 
cooperation and started a cooperative store to 
fight the 'truck system.' Cut and hauled out frame 
for a hospital. Gave work for clothing, getting 
deposits of wood to save enough coal on my 
steamer for next summer's use over two hundred 
miles of coast. Redecked my launch here, giving 
the work to hungry heads of families. There is a 
huge amount of practical work to be done. One 
has to do everything and know everything, e. g., 
to be able to build and handle a boat, to know juni- 
per from spruce, whiclr is best above and which best 
below water, to handle a gun, to know beasts, 
birds and fishes, and all the ways of them, how to 
hunt, trap and catch them — and make the traps, 
too — how to make leather from a seal, to sew up 
a boot, make a sleigh, a suit of clothes, etc. I 



10 Pomiuk 

am terribly tired of just ringing- a bell and telling 
the servant to order whatever is needed ! Applied 
to surgery and medicine, it calls for all one's 
patience. I have had two rooms in a house for a 
'hospital,' (the consulting room, for obvious rea- 
sons, is called 'the insect room') and had patients 
all along the shore as well. Had to train my own 
nurses. I have only a sleeping- bag on the floor 
where my night-watch patients are, etc. But I 
pine to be off at sea. I have the roving spirit 
strong on me." 

Dr. Grenfell thinks some natural history stories 
a bit exaggerated, but there is one piece of 
natural history which he thinks nobody can ex- 
aggerate — and that is the Labrador dog. Here 
is one of his experiences. 

"Modesty is a virtue of which the Eskimo dog 
is seldom guilty. I was visiting one day a bed- 
ridden patient. As the outer door opened, a fra- 
grant scent as of a dinner preparing was wafted out- 
ward. Suddenly an avalanche swept me off my legs, 
and a pack of dogs, whisking the stew-pot off the 
fire, began to fight savagely over its contents, the 
more so as each having burnt its nose in the boil- 
ing liquid, attributed his affliction to his neighbor. 
Meanwhile the house filling with steam and Eski- 
mo imprecations, the latter rendered forcible by 
long harpoon handles, made me almost sorry I had 
called. 

"The 'trail' is usually over the frozen sea, the 
land being too uneven. Good dogs will cover from 
70 to 100 miles in a day. When starting in 
the morning the snow is covered with little 



The Quest for Pomiuk 71 

icicles formed by the midday sun melting frozen 
surface. As this is apt to make the feet of 
the dog's bleed, they are shod with a bag- of seal 
skin, tied round the ankle. Three small holes are 
cut for the claws. A pup shoed for the first time, 
holds up his paws in the air alternately; but once 
he learns to appreciate the fact that shoes save 
his feet from being cut, though he will always eat 
any ordinary piece of skin, such as a kayak or 
a skin boot, he rarely eats his own shoes. They 
do, however, bite at and eat the harness, especially 
of the dog in front of them. Mr. Young tells 
of a big dog which, though apparently always 
hard at work, never seemed to get tired like the 
rest. It always seemed to strain at its trace and 
kept looking round, apparently for the driver's ap- 
proval. His suspicions, however, were aroused, 
and one day, cutting loose the trace, he fastened it 
by a single thread to the komatik. Sure enough, 
the dog strained and worked as hard as ever, but 
it never broke a single thread! 

"Plowing is a humdrum task which these dogs 
do not enjoy. The only way it can be done is for 
one man to march solemnly in front dragging a 
seal's flipper while another man has to shove and 
guide the plow. 

"These dogs are fearless in retrieving birds by 
the seashore. 

"When a flock passes, all the guns are discharged 
simultaneously and the ducks, which at times re- 
spond in showers, are nominally divided equally. 

"But now comes the excitement. As a rule a 
huge Atlantic surf, with these northeast winds, 
break over the point, and the splendid pluck and 
endurance of the dogs is taxed to the uttermost. 
Dashing into the waves, I have seen them re- 



12 Pomiuk 

peatedly hurled back, bruised and winded, high on- 
to the ledges of rock, only to be dragged off by the 
return wave and once more pounded onto the 
rocks. To avoid this, the brave beasts hold on 
with the energy of despair, and many times have I 
noted their bleeding paws, and nails torn off in the 
unequal struggle. Yet they would at once return 
to the charge, and waiting their chance, leap right 
over the breaking crest, and so get clear of the surf. 
Once they seize a duck they never let it go, and I 
have often felt sorely tempted even to jump in and 
give the brave creatures a hand when it seemed im- 
possible for them to keep up the struggle any 
longer. Yet, after being lost to view, engulfed by 
a huge breaker, one would see soon a duck appear, 
and after it a dog's head, still true to its hazardous 
duty. Sometimes, however, they are really lost." 

Dr. Grenfell is often exposed to great danger 
when he is traveling in the North, He fell 
through the ice one day, running ahead of the 
dogs. Fortunately his long whip — 32 feet long — 
always fastened to his wrist — was trailing be- 
hind. His driver caught hold of the end and 
dragged him out. He had a cold run o£ six 
miles and then spoke at the largest meeting held 
that year, in a fisherman's trousers, and, as he 
said, almost standing in his shoes. 

It would be interesting to tell you of some of 
his other adventures, sailing up and down the 
coast and working patiently in his little hospital 



The Quest for Poniiuk 



73 




74 Pomiuk 

at Battle Harbor, but all this you can learn by 
reading his stirring little book on Labrador life 
and adventure, entitled, "Vikings of To-day." 
Doctor Grenfell was at his Battle Harbor hospi- 
tal when the young Americans were in Labrador 
collecting the Eskimo for the World's Fair and 
he saw the Everlina pass on her trip south. Little 
did he imagine that he was ever to have a special 
interest in one of her passengers. 

In August of the same year in which Mr. Mar- 
tin wrote his letter, the little mission steamer 
sailed farther north than it had ever ventured 
before along a coast that had never been chart- 
ed since Captain Cook's voyage of a century 
ago. They crept along the tremendous precipices 
which rise 3000 feet, stopping occasionally at a 
little inlet, where they would find a Moravian 
mission or a few huts of the Eskimo. At one 
of these inlets the Moravians asked Dr. Grenfell 
to go and see a sick man, and as he entered into 
the little hut made of walrus bones, he saw a 
queer little woman sitting at the entrance of the 
burrow. A baby peeked out from the hood over 
•her shoulder, and she was wearing sealskin 
trousers and boots such as all the Eskimo ladies 
wear. "That," said the Moravian missionary, 



The Quest for Pomiuk 75 




POMIUK S MOTHER AND SISTER AT RAMAH 



7(5 Pomiuk 

"is Anniortama. Her husband was the attenek 
or chief of the Eskimos ; he was murdered in the 
high mountains north somewhere, hunting." 

"Stooping very low, we crept along and found 
ourselves in a large hole cut out of the ground. It 
was partially lighted by a window in the roof, made 
of the dried and stretched bowel of the seal. There 
was also a wonderful lamp burning, which gave a 
little heat, and over which some codfish was stew- 
ing in seal fat, while all around hung bladders and 
skins full of blubber for future use. The bowl of 
the lamp was a flat stone, scooped out on the top. 
In it was a large lump of the blubber, and around 
the edge was dry moss, squeezed flat by crevices 
of the rocks in which it had grown. The moss was 
dipped in oil and lighted, the size of the flame 
being regulated by putting the lump of fat nearer 
to or further from the burning moss. 

"Soon it was time for us to leave again. Said 
Brother Stecker, 'If you go round that high cape 
to the north, called Naksarektok, you will find the 
entrance to a narrow inlet. Travel some twenty 
miles up that, and you will find a little house. 
There lives an agent of the great Hudson Bay 
Company, who buys furs from the heathen Eskimo 
living near Cape Chidley/ 

"Tlie fog hung heavily on the hilltops, and foam- 
ing breakers, thundering with resistless force over 
hidden reefs, came in view as we rounded the 
frowning headland. How they roared as we 
passed, and seemed to be spitting out their spite 
at our little vessel, as they flung great clouds of 
spray high in the air in their impotent rage at 
being unable to reach and swallow us up! On 
and on we went, till we came to a dark black gap 



The Quest for Pomiuk 77 

in the cliffs. Perpendicular precipices stood on 
each side, disappearing above into a roof of black- 
est sea-fog. Our lead found no bottom in the 
fathomless depths below. It looked like the en- 
trance to some grim ogre's cavern. Could this 
be the narrow opening we had heard of? None 
of us knew. We could but try. 

" 'Hard a starboard !' to the helmsman ; 'Dead 
slow ahead !' to the engine room, and in we go. 
Darker and yet darker it grew. The cold, wet roof 
of fog, caught between the opposing walls of 
rocks, came lower and yet lower as we went fur- 
ther in. The roar of the surf on the rocks echoed 
louder and yet louder. Suddenly a faint glimmer 
of light — a little more — and then we found our- 
selves in daylight again, in a narrow fiord winding 
away amongst endless naked cliffs, while looking 
back we could see an apparently impenetrable wall, 
forming a gate to this marvelous clift in the 
mountains. On, on and on we went. It seemed 
as if we must be wrong after all. And it was 
after night had fallen before the twinkle of a light 
suddenly greeted the anxious eye of the watch on 
deck. 'Light on the starboard bow, sir,' he 
shouted. 'All right. Stop her. Try the lead.' 
'No bottom in thirty fathoms, sir.' 'Good. Half 
speed ahead. Put her for the light.' 

"What a time it took to reach that light! At 
last, in answer to our steam whistle, we heard 
three rifle shots echoing away among the cliffs. 
Then a second light moving. Soon a splash of 
oars, and then a boat is alongside. A hearty 
Englishman leaps over the rail and cries out, 'Why, 
what ship is this? Where on earth are you from 
and how did you get here?' " 

It was Mr. Ford, the agent, who was rowing 



78 



Pomiuk 




The Quest for Pomiuk yg 

it, and who soon showed the doctor the only 
place down that long cleft in the mountains where 
a ship could anchor, so deep was the water on 
every side. Mr. Ford told them that the Eskimo 
were all away hunting, with the exception of one 
Kupah, whose reindeer-skin tent was further up 
the bay, where he and his family were trouting. 

"They have a dying boy up there also," he 
added, "though it is not their child." 

"Good night," said Dr. Grenfell; "we won't 
fail to search for him in the morning." 

Let me tell the rest of the story in Dr. Gren- 
fell' s ow^n words : 

"At daylight the little jolly-boat was ready once 
more and soon, after a sharp pull, we were search- 
ing with our glasses the edges of the inlet from a 
high promontory jutting out into the bay. Small 
as the tupik was, we made it out, pitched on the 
bare rounded stones close to the mouth of a tor- 
rent rushing from the hills. What a speck it 
looked! Off again at once, and soon we have 
drawn aside the flag which forms the door, and, 
peering in, see sitting on skins spread over the 
raised heap at the end, an Eskimo woman with two 
little girls, while on the cold ground lay a naked 
boy of about eleven years, an old reindeer skin 
thrown over him, his long jet black hair cut, the 
way they always do, in a fringe across his fore- 
head, and his face drawn with pain and neglect. 
It was Pomiuk. Poor little fellow ! His thigh was 



8o 



Pomiuk 




The Quest for Pomiuk 8i 

broken and diseased as well. What could we do 
in our short visit to a place so far from anywhere? 
Only one thing; take him away with us. Could 
that be done? 

"Mr. Ford told them that we were medicine men, 
and wished to make the boy well. He was not 
their boy. He could be of no use to them now, 
because he could not hunt. Would they give the 
boy to us? 

" 'Ajaunamat,' said Kupah, shrugging his 
shoulders; which meant we could do as we liked. 

"So we improvised a stretcher and at once 
carried him to Mr. Ford's house. Here, under 
chloroform, to ease him of his pain, we washed the 
poor child, cleansed and dressed his wound — and 
having left behind his only covering, the dirty 
old reindeer skin, we put on him some clean linen 
and carried him to the Sir Donald. Here we laid 
him in the cabin on the great white skin of a polar 
bear, as he was not accustomed to a bed, and in- 
deed there were no beds aboard. 

"But I must not forget one possession he had. 
It was the only thing in the world he possessed — 
a letter from a gentleman in Boston, named Mr. 
Martin, who had seen Pomiuk at the World's Fair, 
and had tried to tell him of his Saviour. The letter 
had, after long journeyings, reached this port by 
the company's vessel, Erik, on her voyage to 
Hudson Bay, and was lying there till Kupah 
should come with his catch of trout and salmon. 
Now the letter was handed to me ; so we opened it 
and Mr. Ford in Eskimo told Pomiuk what it said. 
Already it was getting time for the Sir Donald to 
be off once more. Oh, how sorry they were to say 
good-bye, so seldom does any one visit their lonely 
station! But away we must go, as we might per- 



82 Pomiuk 

haps never be able to get south after the equinoc- 
tial gales should once set in, and rouse the fury of 
the gigantic waves of the Atlantic." 

It was an impressive moment when Doctor 
Grenfell opened the letter which was to connect 
the two friends of Pomiuk as helpers of him and 
of each other for life. Up to this time they had 
never heard of each other. 

"Who is this Mr. Martin?" asked the doctor 
of Pomiuk, through his interpreter. "Do you 
know him?" 

Pomiuk's face lit up with an expression of ten- 
derness unusual to any Eskimo. 

"Yes," he answered, "me even love him." 

The doctor continues : 

"Kupah from his kayak waved us good-by. 
Soon he would be far out on the edge of the frozen 
sea hunting for walruses and seals. Watching 
hour after hour by the 'blow hole' till a seal puts 
up its head, when whir-r-r-r, and his sharp spear 
would fly true and straight. Or creeping along in 
his kajak to the edge of an ice pan, on which a 
lazy walrus is sleeping. Splash ! splash ! and away 
goes the monster, but not before Kupah has fixed 
into it his stout harpoon. Now all is quiet, but 
Kupah is watching like a cat. Suddenly there 
appears a great round thing on the surface of the 
sea a hundred yards, it may be, or more away, and 
like an arrow from a bow Kupah is after it. It is 



The Quest for Pomiuk 83 

the seal skin filled with air, which is fast to his 
harpoon. Now he steadies himself for another 
shot Up comes the huge walrus, it catches sight 
of its enemy, and, raising itself high out of the 
water, rushes with its huge fierce tusks on Kupah, 
Quick as lightning he darts aside, seizes his long 
lance, and buries it in the walrus' heart. But the 
infuriated beast is not dead, and coming on the 
frailkajak tears it to pieces. Kupah is out of the 
sinking boat in a moment, holding to his paddle 
for support in the icy waves. In the confusion of 
blood and foam the walrus misses its enemy and 
floats close beside him, frantically kicking in its 
death struggle. But hark ! a cheering shout gives 
courage to the drowning Kupah. A second kajak 
darts to his rescue. It is Kalleligak, his good 
friend. He soon drags Kupah into the back of his 
little boat, and, seeing the walrus safe, they speed 
to the ice edge to get help to tow it home. And 
now, on the way back, every man must confess all 
his wicked deeds to the others. Each man must 
forgive all the wrongs any of the others may have 
done to him before they reach the shore, else they 
will never get another walrus. Then a spear is 
driven firm into the ice. Ropesi of walrus hide are 
made fast to their victim, and all the little men, 
laughing and chattering over their good fortune, 
keep shortening the ropes round the spear until 
the walrus lies out of water on the ice floe. Then 
they must give it at once a drink of water in order 
that its spirit may not be ofifended, and in order 
that plenty more walruses may come along. Then 
its head must be carefully split in two, and one tusk 
taken away from the other, so that the next wal- 
rus they kill may not be able to hurt their kajaks." 

And here we leave them forever, these fy^o 



84 Pomiuk 

ignorant wild men, Kiipah the heartless and 
Kolleligak the murderer. They have already for- 
gotten all about Pomiuk who goes sailing south in 
the care of his brave-hearted protector, never to 
know cold and loneliness again. 



Zhc IRescue 



IV 

THE RESCUE 

Oi'' course Doctor Grenfell answered Mr. Mar- 
tin's letter to Pomiuk at once, telling him the 
whole story. He added : 

"Now that the dirt, the worst of the pain and the 
fear of being- touched have passed off, we find him 
a bright, happy and delightful little fellow. We 
shall keep him. From your letter, sir, I judge you 
to be a praying man. If so, you may care to pray 
for a blessing on this Httle outcast. I will, if you 
care, send you a photograph of the boy which I 
took, but I do not know at present whether this 
will ever reach you." 

The letter came safely to Mr. Martin, and from 
his reply, still preserved by Dr. Grenfell, the fol- 
lowing is taken : 

"I am filled with joy and gratitude that God 
should have so graciously brought it about that 
you should rescue my dear boy Pomiuk from his 
sorry condition and certain 'fate. It is like 'the 
lovingkindness of God toward the children of 
men.' I am sure it is of, Him and He will 'surely 
bring it to pass.' Now, I beg you to give Pomiuk 



88 Pomiuk 

my kind love, and tell him I am glad that God has 
taken care of him and brought him to your ship. 
Furthermore, I wish to have a finger in your good 
work. I am myself a poor man, but I am editor 
of a children's department in The Congregational- 
ist and have before told the story of the boy. Our 
children will help support him." 




POMIUK ON THE "'siR DONALd/' SUMMER iSqS 



Mr. Martin now told the "Corner" children 
the marvelous sequel to Pomiuk' s story and asked 
if they would send money so that he might be 
cared for. "He belongs to us," said Mr. Mar- 
tin; "let us take care of him." 



The Rescue 8p 

In the meantime Doctor Grenfell brought 
Pomitik down on his steamer to the hospital at 
Indian Harbor. Mr. Martin's photograph he kept 
always close beside him in a little box. It took 
a month on the way, as there were many harbors 
to visit and many sick folk to care for. It was 
a journey of over 300 miles, even if they had 
gone in a straight course. On the way Pomiuk 
suffered much with pain. Four times the doctor 
had to put him to sleep to give him a little ease. 

At first Pomiuk would eat nothing but raw- 
frozen walrus. It would not seem to us a tempt- 
ing dainty, greasy, slimy, cold and foul-smelling. 
An American boy would much prefer jam. So 
thought the cook. He gave Pomiuk some. The 
boy tried it. It did not agree with him, and after 
that Pomiuk had a boot saved up to hurl at the 
unfortunate cook whenever he should pass. 

It is customary in many publications to give 
recipes for new dishes. I will now, therefore, 
give four recipes I have of Eskimo dishes in 
order of preference according to the little fellow. 
The first is called "suvalik" ; it is made by frying 
cod livers, pouring ofif the oil, and pounding up 
the precipitate with whortleberries. Second, 
"miceurak" ; dry cod powdered and pounded with 



po Pomiuk 

seal oil. Third, "ujak"; seal flippers allowed to 

rot until the hair comes off, and then eaten as 

they are. The fourth is called "igonak" ; consists 

of raw, unsalted cod heads, allowed to lie out in 

the grass until they are "mikkiak," or rotten to 

taste. 

On the way to the hospital, the doctor put in 

at Okkak, one of the Moravian stations, and 

wrote : 

"We obtained some dry reindeer meat for 
Pomiuk here. His appetite is improving with his 
health. He has no pain now except when he is 
dressed, and at present he is asleep by my side in 
the cabin on the settle, with his legs both slung by 
bandages to picture rings in the deck. He has not 
lain on his back certainly for two years, and several 
months he spent on his hands and knees, being 
unable to lie down. Brother Schmidt of Okkak 
has given him a melodeon or concertina, and on 
this he is generally working out 'God save the 
Queen,' or some other tune he has heard." 

And again from a station called "Hopedale," 
where some brave Moravian missionaries live and 
where Pomiuk could talk his own tongue again 
among Christian Eskimo, came the following: 

"The little prince is quietly sleeping on my bear- 
skin. He is so much better, but is easily frightened. 
He saw a poor little girl the other day have five 
teeth out at one sitting, and she cried a great deal ; 
since that he has tried to be braver when we dress 



The Rescue 91 

him. I've been teaching him a Httle counting, my 
cartridge belt making an excellent educator. He 
gets as far as five times five are twenty-five. He 
still retains his love for 'ivik,' i.e.: walrus. I am 
glad to say that 'bake-apples' (berries) from the 
hills, which settlers when on board bring to him, 
share his affection now." 

One of the first things necessary for his relief 

after the doctor's operation at the hospital was 

a prolonged hot bath; but how was the hot bath 

to be arranged for in cold Labrador? This was 

the way it was done : — 

"The sister informed me all our large water 
boilers leaked, so we had to devise some way to get 
hot water. The merchant here, Mr. Smith, kindly 
volunteered the loan of his barking port, in which 
the great fish nets are boiled with bark from the fir 
trees to 'tan' them and make them resist the water 
better, a loan I gladly accepted, and twelve strong 
men slung this over a young tree and marched it 
up near the house to the hospital. We filled it 
with water and fenced it around with wood from the 
wind ; we lit a huge fire below it and kept it going 
all night and all next day. The child has greatly 
benefited by his prolonged immersion." 

As soon as the little boy grew better his old 
happy disposition came back. His nurse, Sister 
Cecilia Williams, a devoted missionary from near 
Canterbury on the east coast of England, wrote : 

"He was delighted with a horse and cart, and a 
Noah's ark with so many animals in it was a great 



p^ Pomiuk 

wonder to him. One day he was shown a doll and 
his curious look of surprise was amusing. He was 
very much struck with the eyes, nose and mouth, 
and looking up, said in Eskimo : 'It is something 
like a baby !' He was shown another doll that had 
come to grief and lost its hair, but which on lying 
down closed its eyes. Pomiuk was very much 
afraid of it, and each time its eyes closed he popped 
his head under the bedclothes." 

He was not always brave about having his 
wounds dressed, even after the little girl had 
shamed him by her grit, and so Doctor Grenfell 
used to chalk on a medicine cupboard in the cabin 
the days of the week and when Pomiuk had kept 
from crying would write under them G, for Good ; 
but when he had been crying, he would write B, 
like this : 

Pomiuk: Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. 
B G G 

When he got so many G's, some little present 
would be given him. 

Soon Doctor Grenfell was away again con- 
tinuing his work of mercy to the south. He put 
in one day at Bonne Esperance, near Salmon 
Bay, where Mr. Martin had been a missionary 
so long ago, and took dinner in the house he 
had built for a mission house. He found as 
one result of Mr. Martin's labors that almost 



The Rescue 



93 




ESKIMO HOME, BURNT WOOD COVE, NEAR RIGOLETTZ. 
POMIUK ON THE GROUND. HEKE HE SPENT THE 
WINTER OF 1895-96 

everybody in the neighborhood knew how to 
read. 

When the sea began to freeze, the hospital on 
the island out in the Atlantic had to be closed 
for the winter, and the nurse and doctor and all 



p^ Pomiuk 

the patients had to be removed. Pomiuk, with two 
other injured Eskimo, was carried to a Httle house 
fifty miles up the long inlet called Eskimo Bay, 
near the largest station of the great fur company, 
and here he stayed all winter. The little house 
had been fitted up for sick people and was called 
"Burnt Wood Cove Hospital," and was much 
warmer than out in the cold, bleak island, for here 
it was nestled away in among the fir trees. 

On his next visit to his mother in England 
Doctor Grenfell went home by way of this coun- 
try, and visited Mr. Martin's house, so that he 
might tell his newly found friends about the 
wonderful work in Labrador. Many children 
were waiting eagerly to see him and their first 
question always was, "How is Pomiuk?" He 
hurried back to Newfoundland in May, but as the 
ice had not broken up, he made another hasty trip 
to England. While he was there he heard from 
the doctor whom he had left in charge of the 
hospital in Labrador, that Pomiuk was better. 
A good Moravian missionary had, late in the fall, 
come to the hospital where Pomiuk lay, bringing 
with him another poor Eskimo who had been 
accidentally shot through the elbow joint. The 
sea froze as soon as he arrived and so he also 



The Rescue 



95 




POMIUK OUT-OF-DOORS. INDI'AN HARBOR. SUMMER OF If 



had to stay near the Httle hospital in the woods, 
until sledge traveling should permit his return 
to his station. After talking to Pomiuk about 
the Saviour, he had baptized him and according 



p6 Pomiuk 

to the beautiful Moravian custom, as the sign 
of his new Hfe in Christ Jesus, given him the 
new name of "Gabriel," the name of the angel 
of comfort in the New Testament. 

Among the American children who became in- 
terested in Pomiuk was a group of boys in a large 
church in Cambridge, who called themselves the 
Captains of Ten, because they were trying to 
be captains of their ten fingers. They met to- 
gether every Friday in three squads to do whit- 
tling and wood carving. The money which they 
earned by the sale of their handicraft and of 
their interesting annual entertainments was given 
to the causes in which they were interested. The 
first money that Doctor Grenfell received from 
them for Pomiuk was $5.92 which they had 
earned themselves. 

The doctor sent Mr. Martin a picture of the 
little hut which was used as a hospital, with 
Pomiuk in front and Mr. Manasseh and Mrs. 
Manasseh, the kind Eskimo people who had been 
helping take care of him. This letter was ac- 
companied by one from Pomiuk, which he dic- 
tated to the doctor, but which he signed him- 
self, and to which he added with his own hand, 
rude emblems of Faith, Hope and Love — that 



The Rescue p^ 

for Hope, being an anchor, he produced more 
successful!}'- than the others! 

"Corner Cot, Indian Harbor Hospital 
"Aukshenai Martin: I got your letter. I 
very glad to see you. Me like to see Ad:artin. I 
very glad Doctor Grenfell come back. I put flag 
up doctor come back. Me all right. I'm happy 
Christmas. Me got shirt, Mrs. Wilson. Plenty 
sweets. I got new name now. Mr. Shultse Gabriel 
me. I got picture book. Thank you picture book. 
[A fit of laughter!] Me stop sister hospital all 
summer. Me got lame, can't walk. Me learn. 
Love Martin. Me 



^f^^^^^iAxl.?ON\\\J^. 



As soon as Doctor Grenfell got back to Labra- 
dor he began to look for Pomiuk. The doctor 
went north on board of an old boat, loaded M^ith 
lumber, in which he made a dangerous passage 
from Newfoundland to Labrador. This was the 
way he found Pomiuk, who had been once again 
brought out of the winter hut to the summer 
hospital at Indian Harbor island, on the outside 
coast : 

"As I steamed in here I noticed a flag stuck out 
of the window of the hospital. It was white, with 
my red cross on it, and with the glasses we could 
see that it was tied onto a crutch! ! ! I guessed 
it must be Pomiuk's flag, and so it proved. The 
patients in the ward told me he ate no dinner when 



gS Pomiuk 

he heard we were in the offing, and the poor little 
chap was almost crying with pleasure. He really 
has more affection than I credited the whole Es- 
kimoi race with before. He had carved me two 
little bony tokens, Hope and Love. I read him 
your letter. He chimed in with 'ah' or 'aila' or 
'mai,' periodically. The lad seems as happy as can 
te, laughing merrily over almost any happy thing, 
as a Christian ought to do." 



Ipomluh fn IRinb Ibanbs 



L.otC. 



V 

POMIUK IN KIND HANDS 

The; next winter Doctor Grenfell visited Amer- 
ica again on his way to England and one of the 
first places he visited was the church where the 
Captains of Ten meet. He gave them a talk one 
evening and one of the members described it as 
follows : 

"He began by saying, *I am a Captain, too!' 
He then drew on the blackboard a map of Labra- 
dor, and all through his talk drew pictures of 
ships, tents, Eskimos, seals and walruses. He 
told us all about the linding of Pomiuk and drew 
a picture of the interior of the tent in which he 
was found. He was lying on the cold stones, 
with only a blanket (reindeer skin) over him. The 
boys of the club enjoyed the talk very greatly and 
showed the speaker as much by their hearty clap- 
ping." 

The doctor quoted these lines about Christ's 
way of doing good, which he said he kept posted 
up in the Sir Donald, where all the crew could 



102 Pomiuk 

read them. I think they are Doctor Grenf ell's 
own life motto : 

"He did tilings so kindly; 

It seemed his heart's delight 
To make poor people happy, 

From morning until night. 

"He always seemed at leisure 

For every one who came; 
However tired or busy, 

They found HIM just the same!" 

By this time a great many children were giv- 
ing help to Pomiuk. Mr. Martin promised each 
one who would send him ten cents a printed 
certificate, containing Pomiuk's picture, and a 
great many dimes came in answer. One boy 
gave part of the money he had earned for Christ- 
mas. In another Sunday-school ten children 
were given a cent apiece in the infant room. 
These little tots, some of them only four years 
old, went to work at once to invest their money 
and made as much as they could. They sold 
candy, pop-corn, etc., and at the end of the week 
brought back $1.31. One of the most unique 
ways by which money was earned for the cot 
was by a boy named Louis, who sent in funds 



Pomiuk in Kind Hands 



103 




SISTER WILLIAMS AND THE CORNER COT, INDIAN HARBOR 

HOSPITAL, FALL OF 1896 ; POMIUK's CRUTCH AND 

RED CROSS SIGNAL 



104 Pomiuk 

which were the proceeds of a rabbit which he 
caught in his rabbit trap. 

It was decided to call the bed on which Pomiuk 
rested the "Corner Cot,'"' and so they printed this 
name over the head of it, and took his picture in 
the bed, with the nurse beside him. Doctor Gren- 
fell said, "It was as difficult to photograph Po- 
miuk as a running dog. It was like smothering 
a volcano." By this time some other children 
had been brought to the hospital. Tommy, a little 
lad of nine, with a diseased spine and paralyzed 
legs, and Elsie, a little girl of five, with a hip dis- 
eased like Pomiuk's. 

Gabriel was like most of the Eskimo — very 
musical. He practiced on his bugle until he gave 
Tommy a headache. "I never saw such a boy," 
said Gabriel, disappointed at Tommy's lack of 
musical appreciation. 

Eittle Elsie, whom the doctor called his "little 
old woman, aged five," was not always a model 
child, but after she had disturbed the others until 
it was necessary to put her in a room by herself, 
she would always ask the Sister to "begive" her, 
and then when she had been "begiven" she would 
say, "I's been peasing Satan to-day." 

Here is Pomiuk's next letter: — 



Pomiuk in Kind Hands 105 

"Aukshenai Martin : I'm glad to get letter. Naku- 
meek anginallumeek (thank you very much indeed). 
Me like more letter. I'm glad bicycle pictures. 
You want my picture. You got my picture here. 
I want some more Martin picture. You ask him 
aukshenai his ladies, Mr. Smith, Mr. Vincent. I'm 
glad to-morrow I'm going to Battle Harbor, I 
suppose. Sister too. Dis man here, sick mani, 
George (a lad with double pneumonia now get- 
ting better) George sing 'Shelf behind the door.' 
I'm sing Takpanele. By and by me learn crutches. 
I'm glad (he means happy) all the time. I'm in 
bath in the morning all the time. Nice, warm. You 
got a bath? Me want you come to Battle Har- 
bor. You come and see me (and) Sister, please. 
Me make little komatik (dog-sledge) for you next 
year, I suppose. Yesterday Sunday. A fine sing 
yesterday (he came to service and lay on the top 
of a chest of drawers). I can't go out now, too 
cold. I'm very laughing. Goodby, Mr Martin. 
Sister put me to bed now. Me Gabriel Pomiuk 
Grenfell, please. Dat's all. [A fit of laughter.] 

Winter again set in, the sea began to freeze 
and Pomiuk was now removed in the hospital 
steamer to Battle Harbor, which is 200 miles 
further south, and which is kept open all the year 
round. So now he had no need to move again. 
Pomiuk also wrote Mr. Martin again this spring. 

"Battle Harbor Hospital, Labrador, 
"March 20, 1897. 
"Aukshenai Mr. Martin: I am glad that 
you sent me a book. I am very sorry I got no 



io6 Pomiuk 

letter at all. I am a lot better now, and I walk 
about on my crutches. Sister make me trousers 
and slippers. I very glad. Sister teach me letters 
and writing. Me got a fine Christmas time, sweets, 
cake and book in the morning. Lot of little girls 
and boys got a tea. We had a big Christmas tree. 
Sister gave Tommy and me Jack-in-the-box. I 
opened box. I very frightened, and they all laugh 
very much. Room very, very pretty, lots of can- 
dles in lanterns, next day lot of people came to 
tea. After tea lot of singing. I sing Takpanele, 
I would like to see you here Christmas day. Tommy 
and me learn 'There is a better world they say.' 
I very sori"y Dr. Grenfell stop in England this 
year. I want a letter more, please. You got 
my photograph? Thank you very much for the 
book we got. Aukshenai, Mr. Martin. Gabriel 
Pomiuk." 

Doctor Grenfell had left Labrador much later 
than usual the previous fall. He had many sick 
folk to attend to and when he had finished per- 
forming an operation necessary to save the life 
of a boy, he returned on shipboard at four o'clock 
in the morning just in time to get out of the 
harbor before it froze up. When morning came 
the harbor was a solid sheet of ice, so that the 
people talked for the next few days of the nar- 
row escape the doctor had from being frozen in. 
On crossing the Strait of Belle Isle a rivet blew 
out of the engine of the Sir Donald, and the 
engineer narrowly escaped. The little steamer 



Pomiuk in Kind Hands lOf 

was at the mercy of the wind and waves. Fortu- 
nately a St. John's steamer hove in sight and 
towed them into a neighboring harbor on the 
Newfoundland shore. Gabriel wrote Dr. Gren- 
fell in the winter as follows : 

"Battle Harbor, Feb'y 6i\\, 1897. 
"Aukshenai Dr. Grenfell : 

"I'm very glad that I can walk with crutches 
now. not much yet. Sister very good, make 
me trov/sers. very warm, trowsers hard to make. 
Sister says me funny shape. Me got a nice little 
slipper, sister make. She make me a coat soon. 
Very frightened when me hear 'Sir Donald' almost 
lost. I am knitting braces. Aukshenai very much, 
Dr. Grenfell. Gabriel Pomiuk." 

Doctor Grenfell spent the next spring and sum- 
mer among the fishermen off the coast of Den- 
mark and Iceland. He took with him his Eskimo 
canoe, and cruised along among the fleet in it. 
Pomiuk was very lonesome while he was gone 
and wrote him this letter: 

"Aukshenai Dr. Grenfell: 'Sir Donald' went 
away too fast. I want to look at her long time 
more. Some time in sleep I see you. Dr. Grenfell. 
I lonesome when you gone away two or three 
days. I afraid you get lost in 'Sir Donald' be- 
cause it is very rough, lot of wind and very much 
snow. Poor little Elsie very fast gone to Father 
in heaven. I very glad. Nice singing in the night: 
[Elsie herself sang, as her last song on earth: 



To8 Pomiuk 

'Jesus, tender Shepherd, hear me. Bless thy little 
lamb to-night.'] Elsie gone in the next morning. 
Sister go home next year, me like to go too. Me 
got a nice time at Christmas. I'm glad I got some- 
thing Christmas morning when I wake up. Me got 
a book, sweets, and a cake. Lots of little girls and 
boys got a tea. It makes them laugh to look at 
Christmas big tree. Sister gave Tommy and me 
Jack-in-the-box. I opened box. I very frightened 
and make some people laugh very much. I make 
some paper chains very long. Sister put candles in 
lanterns, all very, very pretty. Next day lots of 
people come to tea. After tea, lots of singing. I 
sang Takpanele. Boys say hip, hip, hurrah! for 
sisters lots of time. I learn, 'There is a better 
world they say, O ! so bright.' I want a letter by 
and by, please. Me like to see you next year. 
I'm sorry you stop home. One night in sleep I 
see sister with big wings, like gull's wings, only 
very white and very big. 

"Aukshenai, Dr. Grenfell, very much. 

"Gabriel Pomiuk." 

In his letters to both his friends he tells about 
the Christmas tree celebration in which he had 
taken the greatest delight. His nurse describes 
the way they spent the day : 

"Christmas day has come and gone. We had 
been very busy for some time past preparing for 
it. Gabriel made many yards of pink and white 
paper chains from paper in which the wool was 
wrapped at Indian Harbor. We cleared the ward 
and decorated the windows and doors with fir, 
and hung the chains about in festoons, with Ian- 



Pommk in Kind Hands lop 

terns here and there, of which there were twelve. 
Mr. Pitcher, the schoolmaster, helped me very 
much, and he and some of the boys went a long 
way for the fir ; they had to chop away the frozen 
snow to a good depth before they could get it. 
Then we had a Christmas tree! Ben Smith, a 
fisherman, went away very early one morning to 
get it from the bay, and came back with it in 
the evening fixed in a block and standing up- 
right on a komatik. It had to be cut shorter be- 
fore we could get it in the ward, and then it touched 
the ceiling. On the tree we placed a few toys, 
of which there was one for every household, 
then some wonderful sweets were hung on it, and 
fairy lamps. Sixty bags were made, in which were 
some sweets and biscuits — one for each child. 
Early Christmas morning everybody round about 
received a Christmas letter, sent to us by the 
Christmas Letter Mission. One man jumped for 
joy at receiving the first letter he had ever had 
in his life, and begged some one to read it to him 
at once. We went to church in the morning and 
sang old Christmas hymns, and heard the old story 
read of the Saviour's birth. It was very cold, 
i8 degrees below zero, or 50 degrees of frost. 
The day before it was 20 degrees below. Out- 
side my sitting-room door in the hall, the ther- 
mometer was 14 degrees. I think we ought to 
have a stove in the hall, one that will keep the 
fire in day and night. At 4.30 we had forty-nine 
children and some of their mothers come to tea. 
The room and the tree, when lighted up, was a 
wonderful sight to them all. Gabriel fairly 
screamed and clapped his hands with delight. It 
was delightful to see them so happy. Some of 
them were so taken with it all that no coaxing 



no Pomiuk 

would make them take any tea. Went to service 
again in the evening. The next day we had 
another tea for the big boys and grown-up people. 
After tea we had a lot of singing, recitations, and 
a little talk. Gabriel sang four Eskimo hymns, 
much to the delight of everybody." 

The good nurse, .Miss Williams, also wrote to 

Mr, Martin when she sent Gabriel's letter, as 

follows : 

"Dear Mr. Martin: Gabriel was so delighted 
to get the book you sent him. He has been looking 
out for the mail man and said, 'Me get letter from 
Mr. Martin.' He looked very serious when he 
found there was no letter with the book, but said, 
'I suppose he write next time.' He wanted to 
write off at once to you. Here is his letter. He 
dictated it to me first, then he copied that which 
I had written. Has he not got on well with his 
writing? A lady asked me if Gabriel loved Jesus. 
I put the question to him and he said, 'Tell lady 
I love Jesus very much.' 

"Although we have had the most severe winter 
that any one can remember, yet it has been a very 
happy one and the time has passed quickly. I have 
been very busy at times. Up to the present I 
have had 104 out patients. Then nearly every 
evening I have had classes. Pray that our work 
may be abundantly blessed. Yours in the Master's 
service, Cecilia W." 

Sister Cecilia's remarks about the cold remind 

one of the statement of a fisherman, that "it was 

so cold in Labrador that his skipper's orders froze 

as he gave them and they had to wait for the 



9pommk in Kind Hands iii 

weather to moderate to thaw them out so as to 
understand them." 

Doctor Grenfell was very busy all summer in 
his cruise among the English sailors, and once or 
twice he was in considerable danger and hard- 
ship. You can picture some of his experiences 
by reading this letter: 

"My dear Mr. Martin: Here we are, but where 
that is it is difficult to say, for we have had for 
six days head wind and thick fog. We are some- 
where between Iceland and Faroe — no sights for 
six days and no soundings. As I had not received 
any letters since June 2nd, I am penning you this 
letter in entire ignorance of all intercurrent events. 
I've just been wishing with all my heart that you 
could peep into our snug little cabin. It is so 
snug compared with the deck, where the thick, 
damp fog makes it cold and lonely, and where, 
in the intervals of listening for the rote of the 
sea on the rocks (for we think we are near the 
Faroe group of islands), the monotonous blasts of 
the fog horn serve to break the still more monot- 
onous clump, clump, clump of the heavy sea-boots 
of the first night-watch on the decks. A bright 
fire is burning, at which I have just brewed a 
steaming cup of cocoa. Our lamps are brightly 
lighted, which is especially homely, for during 
these past two months we have enjoyed daylight 
all night. All is quiet — the skipper sits reading 
his evening chapter on the locker and the star- 
board watch is turned in. Now you have a com- 
plete picture of us. I wonder what you are doing 
in your little snuggery and all your 'Cornerers' ! 



112 Pomiuk 

"But stop — here is another picture I must send 
you. Perhaps it will please your Cornerers. It is 
of 'Joey,' a little pet seal I have on board. I was 
walking- on the beach the other day when I saw the 
little fellow sunning himself on the stones. He 
was almost a month old, and therefore quite ready 
to leave his mother. So I took him in my arms 
and put him in our boat. He is such a tame little 
fellow. If we leave him forward alone, he comes 
waddling aft, till he gets close to the helmsman at 
the wheel — indeed so close that he has to 'move 
on' or the spokes would hit him. He is so fat he 
can sleep anyhow — on his back, side or face — 
though with the rolling of the vessel is apt to roll 
over like a ninepin into the lee scupper, unless he 
gets fixed against something. When we hold up 
a piece of fish he comes waddling after it. He can- 
not bite very well, but he sucks it down. He often 
takes such a long time and makes such grimaces 
over it that he sets us all a-laughing! I wish we 
had little Pomiuk to play with him !" 

Pomiuk was by this time getting better. Doc- 
tor Willway, who was taking care of him this 
summer, had fitted him up with some crutches, 
and he and little Tommy spent many merry after- 
noons out on the porch of the hospital. Miss 
Williams, the nurse, describes Tommy as follows : 

"His home is on an island about a mile from Bat- 
tle. He has spinal disease ; both legs are completely 
paralyzed ; he is much deformed, but he has a sweet 
little face. He was admitted in the fall of 1895. 



Pomiuk in Kind Hands ii^ 

He is quite a companion for our boy Gabriel. 
They had only one quarrel through the winter and 
that was as to which was the worse — each thought 
himself worse than the other. G. could not walk 
with his crutches till spring. Now he goes well 
with them. 

"The poor Httle fellow did not at first like the 
transfer to Battle Harbor. Sometimes I found 
him crying about it. Dr. Grenfell wrote him a 
letter in which he said he did not like little boys 
. who cried and there was no more crying until the 
morning I left (to return to Indian Harbor). 
Then I found him hidden under the bedclothes, 
having a good cry. To remind him of Dr. Grenfell 
was enough. When we were going he was look- 
ing out of the window with flag in hand. He put 
his hand over his shoulder and held mine tightly, 
but would not let me see his face, — he was so 
brave ! ... I do not think he should have too 
many tfiings for himself. We do not wish him to 
grow up selfish and to expect people to send him 
things. If he has had two things alike, I have 
remarked about other boys not having one. A boy 
came into the hospital one day and Gabriel asked 
him if he had a boat. Later on I saw the boy leav- 
ing the hospital with one of G's boats." 

Almost all the Eskimo people are selfish. They 
have so little that it is hard for them to learn to 
share it. When Pomiuk was at the World's Fair 
he learned to like money as well as American 
children do, and he demanded a five cent piece 
every time he did one of his little tricks, but 
under the gentle influence of the good English 



114 



Pomiuk 




POMIUK AND TOMMY, BATTLE HARBOR HOSPITAL, 
SPRING 1897 



nurse, he learned to love to share his gifts from 
the American boys and girls with others. On the 
day after Christmas the nurse brought to him 
a candy cane, saying, "There is a sweet walking 



Pomiuk in Kind Hands 175 

stick for you, Gabriel," and immediately went 
out. In her room on the other side of the par- 
tition she soon heard a low, but earnest, con- 
versation between Gabriel and Tommy. When 
she went in, there was the sweet walking stick 
broken in two. On inquiry Gabriel said that he 
had thrown half of it to Tommy's cot and that 
Tommy had thrown it back. 

"But," she said, "I gave it to you." 
"Yes," said the little cripjDle, "I didn't want 
to be selfish; I wanted Tommy to have half of 
it, but he says it belongs to me." 

Then she explained to both that she hoped 
Gabriel would, of his own accord, share the gift 
with the other. He had learned his lesson. Po- 
miuk was not only generous and always happy, 
but he was very gentle and lovable and all the 
doctors and nurses grew very fond of him. He 
was especially grateful to Mr. Martin who had 
interested the American children in him and who 
was always sending him thoughtful presents by 
which he could pass away the time. You can see 
one of Pomiuk's plans to show his generosity in 
the following letter : 

"Dear Mr. Martin : — I write you on my desk to 
thank you for it very much. I love the paint 



ii6 Pomiuk 

books very much and Tommy loves his too. He 
will write to you again sometime. I send you 
komatik and rackets. Perhaps I shall ride on 
komatik in winter. Sister says in a coach box. 
We shall have Sunday-school in hospital in the 
winter — all children come here. Tommy and I go 
down in kitchen and learn with them. Thank you 
for your picture, but I want to see your face. 
Aukshenai to little boy and you Mr. Martin, 
from 

Gabriel Pomiuk." 

The "komatik" and "rackets" were toy models 
which Pomiuk with infinite pains had devised 




komatikj made by pomiuk and sent to 
"mr. martin" 

and whittled out himself as a Christmas present 
for Mr. Martin. A student at Boston University 
who was spending- the summer in Labrador 
brought them to Mr. Martin and you may be 
certain he cherishes them as they lie among his 
many other treasures in the children's cabinet 
of his Conversation Corner. "Dear boy !" said he, 
when they came, "how much of love as well 
as of skill the little cripple's hands put into this 
token of his affection !" 



Pomiuk in Kind Hands Jif 

Gabriel was not only fond of playing his bugle, 

but also of singing and he had, for a little boy, 

quite a sweet voice. One of the first hymns he 

ever learned became his favorite and he sung it 

more often than any other. The words were as 

follows : 

Takpanele ! Takpanele ! 
Merngotoryikangilak, 
Siorniorvikarane. 
' Takpanele ! Takpanele ! 

Pillorikpagut ilia 
Sorairata. 

The meaning of these words is: 

Up in heaven! up in heaven! 
There will be no sorrow there, 
There will be no parting there. 
Up in heaven! up in heaven! 
We shall all be happy there 
Forevermore. 

He taught this same hymn to others. Little 
Elsie had learned how to sing from him, and 
Gabriel wrote of her sickness as you have read: 
"Poor little Elsie, very fast gone to Father in 
heaven. Nice singing in the night. Elsie gone 
in the morning." Another of his favorites was, 
" Jesus bids us shine with a clear, pure light," 
which as he learned English he interpreted as 
follows: "You in your schmall corner; Tommy 



ii8 Pomiuk 

in that corner, me in my corner, you in your room 
in your corner," 

Doctor Grenfell, of course, used to talk with 
Gabriel about God and goodness. You know our 
fathers when they were children were taught 
divine things by means of the catechism, of which 
they were not very fond, because it contained so 
many hard words. But the Eskimo language, 
though rather simple, has some long words also. 
The doctor told me that once he was trying to 
teach Pomiuk the need of forgiveness and in do- 
ing so he had to make this remark : "Tsuniagitau- 
tungnaenekarasuartsainartukauialloarpaliulleaior- 
niptinjuit;" which interpreted is, "But we must 
always try to have our sins forgiven." One 
word of sixty-eight letters! 

"Wouldn't that knock a boy off a stool, don't 
you think?" exclaimed Doctor Grenfell. 

At that rate it wouldn't take long, one would 
suppose, to use up the whole language. 

Must n't it be rather hard, too, to teach the 
beautiful Bible thoughts to a people who have no 
word for love, none for sheep, seedtime or harvest, 
fruit-tree or corn, gold or silver? Yet Christ- 
like lives have explained to them what mere words 
could not express. 



Pomiuk in Kind Hands up 

Perhaps, too, you would like to know how an 
Eskimo prescription looks. Here is one that 
Doctor Grenfell wrote for the nurse about Po- 
miuk's medicine. 

"Allupsautangiuk Xakpata Gaksariva ^Mer- 
ingomavit." (A tablespoonful, well shaken, to be 
swallowed after meals.) 

You can almost picture the little suffering, 
patient cripple, in the "Corner Cot," enjoying the 
barren bit of the world to be seen from his win- 
dow, and sharing his pictures with the other sick 
boy, and happy in the love that was in his heart. 
During the ^^ inter days the comfortable American 
children could well be glad to feel that through 
their gifts these little ones who would have died 
of starvation and sickness were warm and cozy 
and receiving Christian care. And at the close 
of the short winter days they could think of the 
little ones saying their prayers, as the nurse knelt 
in turn by their beds; of their calling out in joy 
after her absence for a few hours. ''O Sister ! we 
wanted you so ! We are so glad you are back !" ; 
almost to listen to their laughter and to know that 
although they could not run about like other little 
ones, yet they were well cared for and well loved. 

Dr. Grenfell was always glad when he was in 



120 Pomiuk 

America to meet children who knew of Pomiuk 
and wanted to help him. Two instances have 
been recorded in the "Conversation Corner" 
of dear little girls — respectively in Connecticut 
and North Dakota — whose carefully treasured 
money had been devoted after their death to the 
support of the "Corner Cot." One noon, when 
the doctor was dining in Boston, as he sat 
down to dinner, he found a five dollar note 
under his plate. He asked who had contrib- 
uted it, and he was told, "This is Alice's birth- 
day. She went around to her friends and rela- 
tives who usually give her presents, and asked 
them not to give her any present, but to give 
her the money for the Labrador Mission." Some 
kind lady about this time knit a nice warm sweater 
for a fisherman "by guess." When it arrived it 
was so big that four men got into it at once ! 

You remember I told you that Dr. Gren- 
fell was led to give his life for other people by 
hearing something once said at a meeting in. 
England by Mr. Moody. He never met Mr. 
Moody face to face until his first visit to America. 
He came to the great evangelist then and ex- 
pressed his gratitude for the help he had been 
to him. Mr. Moody, in his brusque, practical 



Pomiuk in Kind Hands 121 

way, said: "And what are you doing now?" 
Dr. Grenfell modestly described his work. The 
result was that Mr. Moody promised his aid, and 
soon after his death Dr. Grenfell came to North- 
field and was entertained at his home and by his 
friends in the very room from which the good 
man passed so triumphantly to glory, and the 
church there is supporting a "Northfield Cot" in 
Dr. Grenfell's hospital. England and Scotland 
and Canada and even far-away Turkey had bound 
themselves by a world-round chain of help about 
the little lame boy. Dr. Grenfell's "precious Lab- 
radorite." 



(Gabriel 



VI 

GABRIEL 

WHII.E so many American boys and girls had 
become interested in Pomiuk and all were much 
encouraged to know how strong he was getting, 
it was a very sad shock for them to read in 
The Congregationalist on the 25th of November, 
1897, that little Pomiuk was dead. One of the 
Doctor's colleagues sent the following letter : 

"Battle Harbor Hospital, Labrador. 
"Dear Mr. Martin : — I am very sorry I must be 
the conveyer of sad news to you. Gabriel passed 
away from our midst September 29 at 9 p.m. 
The shock was one hardly to be realized. On the 
Friday previous he was out on the veranda, run- 
ning his fingers over an autoharp, a present from a 
Moravian missionary, which had just arrived. 
Little did we think that in a few days his harp 
would be of richer tone and the chords of un- 
broken melody ! He complained of headache 
when he came in on Friday. I thought it might, 
perhaps, have been the jolting of the gun which I 
held for him to fire when the steam-launch came 
into the harbor, with Dr. Willway on board. (He 
was so excited when he had the opportunity of fir- 



126 Pomiuk 

• 
ing a gun or a Winchester and the accuracy of his 
aim was remarkable.) The same night he developed 
a little fever, not unusual for his hip disease, but 
after treatment felt much better, though not en- 
tirely well. On Sunday he had a visit from Mr. 
and Mrs. Ford and their boys from Nachvak, his 
former home, and although his head was aching, 
seemed delighted to see them again and make in- 
quiries about his mother. For the next two days he 
had the usual aching of muscles and limbs in in- 
fluenza, which has been through the settlement 
and hospital. On Wednesday morning he de- 
veloped meningitis and became unconscious, fits 
occurring frequently until he passed quietly and 
peacefully home. Mrs. Aspland (formerly 'Sister 
Carwardine') and myself were with him constantly. 
He left no message, because of his unconscious- 
ness, but on Sunday night, when I took prayers in 
the ward, he asked for his familiar hymn to be 
sung: 

'Jesus bids us shine with a clear, pure light, 
Like a little candle burning in the night; 
In this world of darkness we cnust shine, 
You in your small corner, I in mine.' 

Shine he did! His unselfishness and amiable dis- 
position made every one love him, and his mem- 
ory will be fresh in many hearts for years to come. 
. . . The photographs arrived, and we have 
put them over the 'Corner Cot.' Tommy has been 
in it until this evening, when it is taken by a little 
boy five years old, whom we have had in a plaster 
of Paris jacket all summer for spinal disease, and 
on whom I have just operated. He may be able 
to go home in a week or two. Tommy sends his 
very kind love. He was very much pleased with 



Gabriel i2f 

the pictures. Pomiuk bubbled over with laughter 
when the magic box was shown him." 

Doctor Willway also wrote as follows : 

" • . . We cannot be sorry for him. He 
has exchanged a hfe of feebleness for that full life 
beyond. The Lord Jesus was very real to him ; he 
loved so much to hear of Him as the Good Shep- 
herd — now he has taken him to himself. The hos- 
pital seems very desolate to me now. I miss the 
happy smiling face and several times have wan- 
dered) up into the ward, only to remember that he 
is not there and that we shall no more hear his 
ringing, joyous laugh. Tommy, our little para- 
lyzed boy, will miss him much — they were great 
friends. 

"Doctor Aspland buried him on Sunday in the 
churchyard here. For ourselves we are sorry to 
lose such a happy laddie ; he was an example and 
comfort to all who came into the hospital. For 
him we can only rejoice: he endured bravely and 
patiently the limitations of a crippled life, and he 
enjoys his reward. Now he is gone it must be our 
duty and joy to seek to brighten other clouded 
lives and bring into their hearts the sunshine of 
our Saviour's love. Frederick R. Willway." 

And Dr. Grenfell said : 

"Bleak Labrador will seem just a little bleaker 
for the closing of the short chapter of that little 
fellow's Hfe." 

In a sheltered hollow in the little mission grave- 
yard, where others wearied and worn had been 
laid after all their pain and sorrow were over, 



128 Pomiuk 

they laid the Httle body of the brave prince and 
put on his resting-place the new name by which 
he is known in heaven — "Gabriel," which means 
"man of God." That night the mysterious au- 
rora hung in the far north, its banners gleaming 
like the festival illuminations of a royal city. 
The Eskimo watch it with awe and call it "the 
dead at play." But to the sad, yet faithful, Chris- 
tian eyes that looked upon it, it was the shining 
symbol of the joy in the City of God on high 
that another young soldier of Jesus Christ had 
won his way home to his King, the Good Shep- 
herd. 



IPomfuk's dFrienbs 



VII 

POMIUK'S FRIENDS 

Many American children were almost broken- 
hearted at. the sad news. In one Sunday-school 
the children were told that Gabriel would need 
their help no more because he was now well and 
strong and oh, so happy, and that perhaps the 
angel Gabriel had been sent to carry him home. 
The change in the children's faces when they 
knew that it was heaven and not the earth that 
held him was a study and a lesson. At once 
Mr. Martin decided that Gabriel's cot should be 
kept filled and he asked his young friends if they 
would send their money for the little bed, which 
was hereafter to be called the "Gabriel-Pomiuk 
Memorial Cot." People always learn to love that 
to which they give, so you will be glad to know 
that the money has been sent every year since 
then, and that the little cot has been constantly 
filled. 

It is pleasant to know that the story is not 



132 Pomiuk 

finished yet. Little Tommy was the first to take 
Gabriel's place. The nurse, whom we know as 
Sister Carwardine but who soon became the wife 
of one of the mission doctors, wrote in the sum- 
mer: 

"Tommy is well and sends his love. I have 
given him dear little Gabriel's magic box and he 
finds great delight in it. We have several more 
children in now. It is wonderful what a happy 
little fellow he is. Sometimes when he is quite 
alone I hear him singing and clapping his hands, 
and when I ask what all the noise is about he says, 
'I am so happy, Sister, I must make a noise !' 
Surely God's ways are wonderful to a little cripple 
lying in the same position from one year to an- 
other and not being able to move at all. It is not 
the same as if he had always been so. Up to four 
years ago he was the most active and most mis- 
chievous boy on the island." 

He too was baptized and confirmed, when the 
hospital was visited by the Bishop of the English 
Church of Newfoundland. He wrote two letters 
about this time, which in his painstaking way 
took two or three days to compose, one to Mr. 
Martin and one to a lady in Rochester, who had 
sent him a picture. 

"Dear Mr. Martin: — Thank you very much for 
your letter. This is Sunday. The Doctor and 
Sister are gone to church. I am in Gabriel's cot. 
He ia happy now in Heaven. I should like to be 



Pomiuk's Friends 133 

there too. I have a Httle boy on the side of me 
with a sore leg hke Gabriel had. I thank you for 
the picture. I like it very much. I had the 
measles this summer and 3 more boys. Sister 
will soon be going away. The Doctor is going to 
Cape charles to-morrow. I try to be a better boy 
every day. Your friend 

"Tommy." 

"... Thank you very much for the cats. 
I like Tommy best. I feel better this spring. The 
sores are better. I saw Julia sheriden (the medi- 
cal steamer) and Sir Donald coming. Dr. Will- 
way, Dr. Massey, Miss Windell came. I am glad 
to see them. I help Sister to sing hymns in 
prayers. Got three little boys here and a girl. I 
miss Gabriel very much in the winter. I'd like to 
be as good as Gabriel. I send my cats to Arthur 
(the boy with hip disease, "like Gabriel") to look 
at, he was not long come from the operation. I 
am in the cot Gabriel was in, in the Corner cot. T 
am thirteen years old. My birthday is on St. 
Stephen's Day. I wish I was as good as he. I 
can see the wharf from my window and all the ves- 
sels that come in and Mr. Hall's men to work. 
My father is crippled in the hospital here, and my 
mother is dead. I am happy here and love Jesus, 
he makes me happy. 

"Good by, with Tommy's love." 

Again the brave boy wrote : 

"I have big sores on me. But I am very happy. 
I think of Jesus very much now, and how he suf- 
fered much more pain for me, and that always 
helps me." 

In June, 1900, little Tommy died and one of 



TS4 Pomiuk 

the doctors had to write another sad letter to Mr. 
Martin. 

"Dear Mr. Martin: — It is with a sorrow I cannot 
express I am forced to inform you that the 'Gabriel- 
Pomiuk Cot' is again empty. Tommy left us on 
April 4, after five months of great suffering. You 
know something already of his illness. He came 
to us four and a half years ago, suffering from 
spinal disease, covered with bed-sores, and his 
limbs so contracted that his knees almost touched 
his chin. After about a year he got well of this; 
although paralyzed in his limbs, he was otherwise 
well and, as he has told you in his letters able to 
get about in his cart. This little cart, the gift of a 
kind friend, made his last summer no doubt the 
happiest he has ever spent. .He was out almost 
daily and attended day school and Sunday-school 
as well as the Sunday service. He had no pain or 
sickness of any kind, except the paralysis. After 
I left for my winter travels last November, he got 
a severe chill one- Sunday afternoon, coming from 
school. He could not eat his tea and fever set in; 
a fresh tubercular disease started in his spine again. 
When I returned in February, I could hardly be- 
lieve it to be the same 'Tommy', his face was so 
pinched and his body a mere skeleton. How glad 
he was to see us ! Everything was done for him ; 
he was attended day and night. 

"At first Tommy was always asking if he could 
not get better, but v^^hen we had to tell him that he 
would not be better, he took it very quietly. For 
weeks before his death, he anticipated it with joy. 
Some nights when I would say good night to him 
after prayer, he would say, T wonder whether He 
is coming to me to-night' — I thought he wished he 



Pomiuk's Friends 755 

would. He came at last, with great quietness. 
The little boy slept, and is now 'alive forevermore.' 

"I need hardly tell you that we felt his loss very 
keenly, A more loving disposition I never knew. 
He was not without faults and boyish tempers, but 
there was a strong and loving desire to do right 
and good. Like all bed-ridden children he was 
much older than his years, and talked often like a 
grown-up person. His last message to the people 
was : 'Tell them to love Jesus.' 

"We buried him on April 6th. I was sorry he 
could not be placed beside Gabriel, for that yard 
was full, but doubtless they are together in a 
richer sense. His American flag quilt sent him 
last year by the Captains of Ten, I buried with 
him, just before closing the coffin. The magic box 
and various other little things which the Cornerers 
have kindly sent him from time to time, were all 
put in the coffin " 

The American quilt which the doctor speaks of 
was made by these Captains of Ten in Cambridge, 
at Dr. Grenfell's suggestion. Thirteen boys were 
at work upon it, which was very appropriate, be- 
cause they made thirteen stars. The boys learned 
how to crochet in order to make it, first practis- 
ing with green and yellow yarn, and then being 
given the red and white stripes of worsted. This 
starry flag, made thick and wadded, covered little 
Tommy as long as he was sick, and he was buried, 
like a soldier, beneath it after he was dead. 

Dr. Grenfell was among the fishermen on the 



136 



Pomiuk 



Newfoundland shore when Tommy died. He 
was already planning some more kindnesses for 
his Labrador children. He had found a family of 
five half-breed Eskimo children, whose father and 




CAPTAINS OF TEN, CAMBRIDGE, MAKING COVERLET FOR 
GABRIEL POMIUK COT 



mother died in one week and he was seeking a 
home for them in America. Up in New Hamp- 
shire there were a farmer and his wife who lived 
in a pleasant valley on a lonely road three or four 




THE LABRADOR ORPHANS FINDING A HOME IN NEW 

HAMPSHIRE (FREDDIE AND BESSIE SECOND AND 

IHIRD FROM top) 



1^8: Pomiuk 

miles from the village. They had one little baby 
of their own, but they were very anxious to do 
all the good they could, and as soon as they heard 
about these poor orphans, through their pictures 
and Mr. Martin's appeal on his '*Corner'" page, 
they decided to take one of them. The boy Fred- 
die, who had been cleaning brasses on Dr. Gren- 
f ell's new ship, the Strathcona (named for Sir 
Donald Smith, now worthily made "Lord Strath- 
cona" by the Queen) was the one selected; but 
when it was found out that no one claimed his 
sister Bessie, whose other name was Rachel, they 
generously decided to take them both. It was 
December (of 1900) before the two little orphans 
reached Boston ; Mr. Martin met them there and 
the next morning started with them on the way 
to their New Hampshire home. Of that ride he 
wrote : 

"There was little chance to 'leave any articles in 
the cars'; their only articles were two small bundles, 
Bessie's extra clothing being left in the haste of 
sailing at the shore hospital, and Fred's trunk hav- 
ing missed the steamer at St. John's. It was a 
long, slow ride, with biting wind, and mercury 
below zero. Alfred spent much time in writing 
words on bits of paper, copying exactly what I 
wrote for him, or the names of stations which he 
saw from the window. Bessie hummed tunes 



Pomiuk's Friends 139 

which she had somewhere picked up, for both have 
sweet voices and can play several tunes on the 
piano, although they had never seen one until they 
reached Nova Scotia. As we stopped at one sta- 
tion after another, Fred asked, 'Shall we go ashore 
at the next place?' Although we left no snow in 
Massachusetts, it gradually increased as we as- 
cended the Merrimack valley, and branched off 
among the hills. When we 'went ashore,' the 
young farmer who met us at the station packed us 
snugly into a small sleigh, covered us with blankets 
and buffaloes and drove us several miles to his 
home. 

'The horse knew the way to carry the sleigh 
Through the white and drifted snow.' 

Drifted it certainly was on one long hill, and it took 
all the farmer's skill as he got out and jumped 
along beside the sleigh to keep us from capsizing ! 
We found a warm welcome, a warm fire, and a 
warm dinner in that little farmhouse, and the chil- 
dren were happy. They were soon sliding down a 
small hill on the crust — and we had a capsizing on 
the sled, if not in the sleigh. I persuaded them at 
last to go into the barn and see those great, strange 
animals, the 'coos.' Afterwards, when they were let 
out to drink, the boy was only easy when he held a 
whip for self-defence, but when they started for the 
spring he followed them, brandishing his 'vip' and 
shouting, 'Go doon, go doon !' The corn-fodder 
on the barn floor attracted them and Bessie called 
the husks 'sinews,' reminding her of the sinews of 
the deer which her people use for thread. I 
showed them an ear of corn. 'Oh, how beautiful!' 
said Fred. 'They are like beads,' said Bessie. 
Both were surprised that out of those 'beads' 



140 Pomiuk 

were made the muffins they had eaten for break- 
fast. 

"And so I left them (the next day), full of cheer 
and promise in their new home among the Granite 
Hills, with old Ascutney just showing his head 
through a notch in the western range." 

A year later Dr. Grenfell on his way from Mon- 
treal to Boston called to see the children and 
when he found that the parents were poor and 
had a child of their own, he couldn't help saying 
to the mother, "What made you take two more 
children of some one else's?" 

"Why," she answered, "I felt life was passing 
away and I was hungry at heart to do something 
for Jesus. I prayed about it ever so much and 
when at last I saw the story of Freddie and 
Bessie in The Congregationalist, I knew the good 
Lord meant me to take them." 

They were so happy in their New England 
home. One day last summer I went to a "Grange 
Picnic" beside a New Hampshire pond. After 
dinner there was speech-making. The orators 
sat on a low platform among the trees. One 
of them was the governor; beside them sat the 
chairman, who was a sweet- faced woman. Pretty 
soon, while an eminent Westerner was speaking, 
the chairman's little child came climbing up on 



Pomiuk's Friends 



141 



the platform and crept up in his mother's lap 
to have a sliver pulled out of his bare foot. This 
mother was the one who took the orphan Eskimo 
children, and there they were, Freddie and Bessie, 




KIKKINA AS TAKEN INTO THE 



frolicking about the woods like strong young 
Indians. 

The Memorial Cot has also been continually 
filled with sufferers and often it contains a little 
child. There was a little girl, named Kirkina, 
(Kir-kee'-na) who was brought to Dr. Grenfell, 



142 Pomiuk 

little more than a mass of rags. "An animated 
pen-wiper," Dr. Grenfell called her. When she 
was two years old she crawled out of the house 
one cold winter day, and while waiting for her 
father froze both her feet. The circulation was 
never restored and the legs, which had become 
dead, were cut off by the father with an axe. 
She was a wild thing, like a bear's cub, hiding 
herself in the bedclothes when he came near. 
She could speak only in Eskimo, but she was 
bright and pretty and in good health in spite of 
her crippled condition. Now of course the 
American children must work together to get her 
some artificial feet, and very soon these were 
furnished to her. She was delighted. "Me's 
not 's'amed now, Sister," she exclaimed proudly. 
It was rather hard for her to get used to them, 
for she was such a healthy child that she was 
almost as broad as she was long; and oftentimes 
the Doctor would hear her cry that "her legs 
were broken" and he would have to go and set 
her up on them again, when they had suddenly 
given out. She also began to write letters to 
Mr. Martin, and here is one of them. 

"March the 8 1902 
"Dear MR martin i was so glad with the doll that 



Pomiuk's Priends 



143 



you sent me i was overjoyed on Christmas sister 
had such a grand party for all of us children my 
doll was present we had a Christmas tree and such 




KIRKINA S DOLL 



a lot of toys that sandy claus gave us children all 
a present myself a noas ark and a bag of candy 
each we all love sister doctor for making our Christ- 
mas so joyful and thank these who was so kind to 



144 Pomiuk 

send so many toys and I thank very much for such 
a nice doll i just love her and I knows she loves me 
and I will take care of her i have her away afraid i 
may break her on my comatic 

"now i must tell you about my legs that the doc- 
tor has made for me i can walk to sunday school 
and go on messages for sister it seems nice for me 
to be able to walk on feet was it not good of the 
doctor to make me a pair of legs you see I am their 
own little girl now please mr martin excuse my 
writing i am only in one book so you see i cannot 
writ thank you for your picture it was good of you 
to think of me i must close i will writ longer next 
time good by mr martin from your friend, 

"Kirkina" 

This happy outlook of a child is also seen in 
a remark made by an American little girl in a 
New Hampshire Sunday-school into which Mr. 
Martin dropped one Sunday. While he was tell- 
ing the story of Kirkina this child put up her 
hand for something she had to say. 

"What is it?" 

"That little girl won't have cold feet any 
more!" 

A lady in Massachusetts sent her a doll which 
had been the family pet for two generations. 
It had had three new heads and many new cos- 
tumes, but it was just as good as new. Strange 
to say, this dolly, as soon as it reached Labra- 
dor, caught the fever for writing letters and wrote 



Pomiuk's Friends 145 

back the following letter about her mistress, Kir- 
kina : 

"Dear Cornerers : — Do you remember the doll 
that was sent to Kirkina last summer? Well, I 
am that doll. Would like to tell you all the 
strange things which have happened to me since I 
left Boston, but my feelings overcome me at the 
recollection. I will only say that after months of 
knocking about in different ships and in strange 
places I reached my home at last, about a week 
ago. I was introduced to my new mistress before 
I had recovered from the effect of my travels. 
But she secerned to think nothing of my crushed 
appearance ; and said, 'Oh, a dolly — she got teeth ! 
Oh, she go to sleep !' Then after looking me over 
carefully, she exclaimed, 'Oh, she got clothes ! she 
got hair !' 

"While she was examining me I looked at her, 
and I saw such a strange-looking little girl. She 
had a very dark skin, and I afterward found she is 
part Eskimo. She is quite stout, but she is very 
short ; in fact, she is almost as broad as she is long. 
I then saw that she had no feet, and that she walks 
on her knees. Dr. McPherson is making artificial 
feet and legs for her, which will be ready in a few 
weeks. 

"There are four other little girls here just now, 
one of whom I was quite surprised to find was 
Bessie B's cousin on her way to join Bessie in New 
Hampshire. Another was Billy Clark's sister, 
who is to join Billy in England. The other two 
little girls will stay here for the winter. One is 
a patient, but Clara has no home and is waiting for 
somebody to give her one. She is a dear little girl 
and as she likes to play with me, Kirkina lends me 



146 Pomiuk 

to her often. I am sending photographs of Clara, 
Kirkina, and myself. I have written you such a 
long letter that I really feel in need of an afternoon 
nap. 

"Kirkina's Dolly Daisy. 
"Battle Harbor, Labrador, Nov. 9." 

Kirkina has lately been taken by a good woman 
in Halifax and in her new home she is already 
becoming quite a fine-looking Nova Scotia girl. 

One of the funniest letters that ever came from 
the Labrador children was from Billy, who 
was for a time in the hospital and who has been 
adopted by a family in England; 

"Dear Dr. Grenfell : — How are you getting on ? 
Poor little Bodie is dead. De dogs bitten her ; all 
de dogs is down along. He bite Sister's arm, and 
he well again now. I had lots of stuff pick out to 
tell he, but I can't remember. I have been good 
and bad and I go till school now. Billy." 

In describing the suffering of the unfortunate 
Labrador children, we have not begun to tell you 
how brave they are, but the following will show 
what they endure and how they endure it : 

"A letter received from a fishing setttlement at 
Bonne Esperance in the Straits of Belle Isle 
(where Mr. Martin used to be missionary) incloses 
such a touching story of two other Labrador chil- 
dren, that I will tell it to you briefly. The little 
brothers, aged eight and twelve, went out from 



Pomiuk's Friends 



H7 




KIRKINA 



14^ Pomiuk 

their 'room' one Tuesday afternoon for a short pull, 
when a sudden fog shut down upon them and they 
could not find the way back. The older brother 
wanted to anchor, but his little brother begged so 
hard to help in rowing home, so that he could see 
his mother. They tried it, but in vain. The next 
day, when the fog lifted, they were out of sight of 
land — they knew not w^here. The only food they 
had were frozen caplins — the little fishes used as 
bait for the codfish. They ate these and broke off 
bits from the field of ice which surrounded them to 
quench their thirst. After three or four days the 
younger boy's strength gave out, and although his 
brother encouraged him to stick to his oar, so 
as to keep warm, he at last lay down in the boat, 
his brother covered him with a bit of sail, and he 
died. 

"On Saturday the lonely little sailor saw land 
and, unable to row longer, set a small sail and 
reached a harbor. This proved to be St. Augus- 
tine, over fifty miles away, and on the next day the 
boy, with the body of his little brother, was put on 
a passing schooner and taken home. Meantime, 
his family and the little community were in great 
grief, unable to find the missing boat and suppos- 
ing it had been swamped far at sea. On Sunday 
evening, the bishop of Quebec being on his visit 
to that region, they all convened in the little chapel 
on the island — I well remember worshiping in it 
when on a vacation visit to that coast twenty years 
ago — and held a memorial service for the lost chil- 
dren. As they came out of the chapel it was found 
that the brave little boy had just returned home, 
safe and sound." 

I have told you of Pomiuk's Christmas when 
the doctor was away. Now you will be in- 



Pomiuk's Friends i^p 

terested to know how the doctor celebrates it 
among his Newfoundland fishermen : 

"Dear Mr. Martin: ... We have had a 
delightful Christmas. I had a lot of games for the 
children — and all are children here, practically. 
We had a huge Christmas tree, with ninety-three 
children, besides adults. No one had ever seen 
one before. On the sheet which concealed it a 
series of lantern pictures was first thrown. They 
took my story about Father Christmas and his 
preference for Arctic regions too literally, so that 
when the sheet suddenly fell and disclosed him in 
full dress on the top of a ladder, in the brilliantly 
illuminated tree, there was almost a panic. 

"I had also two days' games for men on the ice, 
having like Obadiah to feed nearly fifty in our 
club-house during the time. We had a scramble 
for sweets on the ice and a greased pole stuck up 
in it_ One out of the hundred men got up, and 
he climbed it twice, whirled around on the top and 
came down head first, so carrying off both first 
and second prizes. The obstacle races caused 
great fun. The best was a large seal net doubled 
again and again and pegged down on the ice, and 
under this the runners had to crawl. A lot of the 
boys got meshed in it! Then they crawled 
through barrels. One stout man, on reaching the 
obstacles, found all the barrels occupied except a 
lime barrel, which was just too small for him. But 
he got his head through, and getting on his legs, 
went on until his wooden racing suit fell to pieces. 
Later a hundred men shot at a wooden deer 
mounted on a komatik and by a fish line attached 
to each end made to gallop to and fro between two 
flags, each competitor having a shot at the target 



1^0 Pomitik 

(pasted over his heart), at a distance of seventy- 
five yards. Considering the heterogeneous collec- 
tion of antiquated guns, the shooting was good !" 

When Doctor Grenfell was coasting along the 
shore in the summer of 1900, he met Pomiuk's 
mother, who he thought should be called "Re- 
gina," because married to Valentine, the "king" 
of the Eskimo at Hebron ! He writes : 

"We have an excellent photograph of a royal 
dinner party, a thing I never possessed before : 
the king and queen, with a solitary courtier, 
sitting on the rocks, gnawing contentedly at raw 
walrus bones!" 

Pomiuk's mother gave him a hearty salute 
when she met him and paid a special visit to 
thank him for his kindness to Pomiuk. 

One of the superstitions of the Eskimo is that 
they never mention the names of the dead, lest 
their spirits arouse and harm them. Pomiuk's 
mother did not share this fear, or else she had 
become persuaded that the gentle spirit of her boy 
could do her no wrong. 

Dr. Grenfell is now pretty well known in 
America. The Harvard students have cheered his 
lecture in Sanders' Theatre, college professors 
have been eager to talk with him about his ex- 



Pomiuk's Friends 



151 



plorations and discoveries, Dr. Edward Everett 
Hale gets folks to give him Murdock's Food for 
his Eskimo babies, and thousands of American 
boys and girls have grown big-eyed at witnessing 
his pictures of the fisherfolk of the far North. 
This spring there came to the Battle Harbor 



INASMUCH 
AS YE HAVE DONE IT UNTO ONE OF THE 

LEAST OF THESE MY BRETHREM i , 



dr. grenfell s motto in battle 

harbor hospital. carved by 

"captains of ten"" 

hospital a motto that now hangs over its front 
door, carved by the Captains of Ten of Cam- 
bridge. 

"Inasmuch As Ye: Have Done It Unto One 

oE THE Least oe These My Brethren, Ye 

Have Done It Unto Me." 

The letters are ten inches high and the motto 

stretched out in one line is over 46 feet long. The 

background is all cut out, leaving the letters one- 



1^2 Pomiuk 

half inch in relief. The border is painted green, 
the letters are left in natural color and all are 
varnished. It was hard and monotonous work, 
requiring the mallet for most of it. 

Miss Mackintire, their superintendent, said : 
"The motto has done its work here. The pa- 
tience, perseverance and self-mastery developed 
helped my Captains!" 

I think now I have told you the story up to the 
present, but as you see it is not yet finished, and 
perhaps it never will be. Dr. Grenfell is still 
going up and down the Labrador coast, making 
sick people well and little children happy, using 
sometimes his newest ship, the Queen Alexandra, 
named for the beautiful queen by her express 
permission, — a brother to the friendless and a 
father to the orphan, and living the brave life of 
an English Viking. Mr. Martin keeps on think- 
ing about his old parishioners and their children. 
Good ladies in Boston keep asking Dr. Grenfell 
to show them more ways in which they can help 
his people in the North. He sends them curious 
little fur bags made by the Eskimo women and 
girls, which they buy for ornaments and treasure- 
bags, and beautiful plumes which come from the 
wild birds that the Eskimo eat, which American 



Pomhik's Priends 755 




DR. GRENFELL, IN HIS LABRADOR WINTER COSTUME 



154 Pomiuk 

ladies love to put on their hats. As Mr. Martin 
says, "It is not inhuman. If those people are 
willing to eat the owls, our ladies need not hesi- 
tate to wear the feathers on their hats." And 
the children, too, they are still busy in helping 
Kirkina, and we hope even after Kirkina has 
grown to be a woman and the children who 
love her are American men and women, that the 
Memorial Cot will still be filled with those who 
suffer, by the generous hands of other American 
children still to be born, and that the memorial 
of the little Labrador "prince," who was so brave 
and happy and generous in his suffering, will 
never be forgotten. 

"The finest missionary alive" has been sharing 
my office in Boston lately. Here he sits to-day 
opposite me, an athletic figure, with a round, rus- 
set face, clear blue eyes, light mustache, and tells 
with his clear-cut English speech and quiet 
English way, yarns of adventure that make my 
boys want to follow him at once to the North- 
land. His heavy fur-lined overcoat is the only 
reminder in his costume of his long and hard 
travelings by land and sea. The room smells 
of camphor, for here is a box of fur and feather 
handiwork of his Eskimo friends; there are bar- 



Pomink's Friends 



155 






PI H 



t^ O 




1^6 Pomiuk 

rels of goods marked for the Strathcona ; and 
yonder are medical treatises and books about 
children's games for man and child in Labrador. 
To-morrow he starts North to the ten months' 
cold and three months' night. 

Your hand at parting, brave fellow. You go 
North to show the children of the cold that kind- 
ness is Christlikeness. I remain here to try to 
do the same, and you, reader, fare you west or 
east or south, will you join hands also and circle 
the world with kindness too? 

For "this fable teaches," as the story-books 
would say, that a single deed of thoughtful kind- 
ness goes on and on through the years and no 
one can tell how far it will go or to what benedic- 
tions it may attain. 



DEC 2 1903 



